Programa de estimulação de linguagem oral para crianças com atraso de linguagem

Abstract

Program of verbal language stimulation in children with language delay The acquisition and development of language are primary in a child's life, especially because language is one of the main means of social interaction. Therefore, it is of great importance that a good language development has been assured to children and, when necessary, a good intervention in their difficulties. Currently, in the field of children's language in Brazil, different therapeutic approaches are argued, but the necessity of development of structured therapeutic programs is verified, elaborated with technical and scientific quality so that they may stimulate the different abilities of language, aiming to consider the specifics of each child in order to minimize the difficulties. Such intervention programs would guide speech-language pathologists to plan their therapies and provide more effective in the therapeutic process. The aim of this study was elaborate and tests the applicability of a program of stimulation of verbal language for children with language delay from the ages of three to six years old. For this reason, the stimulation program was judged by peers (speech pathologists who are master in Language and have experience with Child Language Intervention) after it was design. The judges verified if the strategies was coherent about (a) the stimulation target and (b) the complexity level. In order to follow up children with language delay at the program, it was applied into 10 children with language delay without any other difficulties (sensorial and/or neurological) covered 20 stimulation sessions. This program was applied during seven weeks with three sessions each week. Children was submitted to a pre-stimulation assessment and then to stimulation program, after to a post-stimulation assessment. In pre-stimulation and post-stimulation assessment the phonetic inventory, and phonological organization, the receptive and expressive vocabulary and pragmatic abilities of the child was analyzed. As a result, the program was classified as adequate by the judges and the children was capable to done the tasks and manifest the communication behaviors adequately. Moreover, was observed that the children had a statistically significant improvement (p< 0,05) in the global language, receptive language, expressive language, expressive vocabulary, phonological work memory and communicative abilities in the post-stimulation assessment. In conclusion, the program reach the goal, since it could give direction and enhance to the speech-language pathologists in cases of difficulties in verbal language, emphasizing the stimulation of phonetic-phonological, syntactic, lexical-semantic and pragmatic language levels and psycholinguistic skills.