When Young Children Need Help by Hirschland Deborah;

Author:Hirschland, Deborah; [Hirschland, Deborah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Redleaf Press

12

When Language Is Limited

Helping Two Boys Who Struggle to Communicate

Jonathan and Emilio are friends. As best they can be, that is, given how hard it is for each of them to communicate with the other. These boys first appeared in chapter 2. Jonathan is the child who spends much of his playtime at the train table, where he can be seen running trains back and forth along the track with “choo-choos” and “woo-hoos” accompanying their repetitive journeys. Emilio likes trains, too, though he doesn’t play with them for long. Actually, Emilio doesn’t play with anything for long. Nancy once called this boy an “odd little butterfly,” and it is an apt description; he appears to flit through the classroom, alighting here and there for mere moments of interest before taking off again.

Two Children, Two Variations on a Theme

Claudia and Nancy have concerns about both Emilio and Jonathan and would like me to come in and observe them. That way, I’ll have a picture of how they’re doing before we brainstorm about ways to offer each one some additional support. I schedule a morning’s visit to their classroom, with a team meeting to follow the same day. A few days beforehand, Claudia gives me some initial background about the boys and fills me in on some of what she and Nancy are thinking and wondering about. She has a lot to share.

Claudia and Nancy are quite sure that Jonathan has some hard-wired challenges connected to language processing. They’re just beginning to wonder whether the same may hold true for Emilio. That’s because Jonathan, who is almost four, has grown up in an English-speaking household. Emilio, on the other hand, is a second-language learner.

Emilio’s parents are from Mexico, and Spanish is the only language spoken at home. This is his first year in a child care program—he just turned three. Up until this point, Claudia and Nancy have felt comfortable giving Emilio extra time to settle in. He has a lot to get used to: a new language, a group setting full of children, unfamiliar routines, different foods. Now, however, it is early January and these teachers are getting concerned.

It’s not how rarely Emilio uses any English that has Claudia and Nancy worried. They have had many kids arrive in their classroom speaking only their family’s native language, and they know that the rate at which children learn a second one can vary widely. But Emilio’s progress in using even a few words of English feels like it’s on the slow end of what’s typical, and it turns out that he’s not speaking much Spanish at home either: his mother recently mentioned that he isn’t talking the way his older brothers did at this age.

So Claudia and Nancy are beginning to have questions. Should Emilio be evaluated for possible language-processing issues? What about his striking lack of focus and frequent silliness—are they connected to how little Emilio understands of what is going on around him? Or do they stem from a different source? Claudia sometimes describes Emilio as a “love.

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