Developmental language disorder
Developmental language disorder (DLD) is a condition where children have significant problems understanding and/or using spoken language. There is no obvious reason for these difficulties.
We think that the part of the brain for speech and language might be wired a little differently from a person with more typical language development – but the differences are subtle and won’t show up on a brain scan. We know that genes play an important part in DLD, but there is no medical test to see if a child has it or not.
Studies have shown that in five year olds, DLD affects about two children in every classroom in primary school (about 7.6%) and that it is more common in boys than girls. In the past, DLD was known as specific language impairment (SLI) but recently the name has changed so that it better reflects the types of difficulties children have. For a diagnosis of DLD a child must have significant, longstanding language difficulties that continue into school age and beyond.
What sorts of problems would a child with DLD have?
DLD looks different in individual children and will vary with age but almost always children will have difficulty understanding spoken language. They may also have difficulties putting their thoughts and ideas into words and sentences. They might have some of these difficulties:
- listening and understanding words and long instructions
- getting their message across, even though they have ideas
- finding or remembering the words they want to use and learning new ones
- talking in sentences but be difficult to understand with words missing, in the wrong place or with the wrong endings
- disorganised or muddled talking making it difficult to follow what they are saying
- finding it hard to join in and follow what is going on in the playground or breakdowns in interactions with others.
Language difficulties can often be ‘hidden’ because instead of communication difficulties, people may see children struggling to learn to read, showing poor behaviour, having difficulties learning or interacting with others. Some children may become withdrawn or isolated.
What can I do to help?
Something we can all do is to make the communication situations as communication friendly or supportive as possible. This means everyone thinking about:
- the physical environment -make it organised and visual, using photos, pictures, signs and gestures to back up words
- the communication style of the people within those environments – keep language simple, pause and give ‘thinking time’, be positive about what the child does well
- the child’s opportunities to communicate.
If you have concerns about your child’s language development speak to your health visitor, preschool, school or contact our service
Where can I find out more?
You can find more information about DLD at ican.org.uk and www.talkingpoint.org.uk.
www.dldandme.co.uk is a website for kids and teenagers to learn about DLD and to share how they’ve told others.
There are also a range of videos about DLD on the YouTube channel, RADLD.