Quick and confidential, the LENA Developmental Snapshot is a unique service for parents and clinicians
The earlier that language delays and disorders, such as autism, are diagnosed and treated the better. However, many infants and toddlers still aren't tested for a number of developmental disorders; frequently, they pass under the radar and miss a crucial opportunity for early intervention. Nevertheless, hope and change are on the horizon. President Barack Obama - a devout advocate for early childhood education - plans to roll out extensive screening programs for all newborns and rescreening for all two-year-olds.
In the meantime, parents and clinicians concerned about language delays and disorders can use the LENA Developmental Snapshot to quickly and easily measure receptive and expressive language skills. A child's receptive and expressive language skills provide information about overall language and cognitive development. Receptive language skills refer to what a child understands; these skills represent the child's language comprehension. Expressive language skills refer to language output; these skills are a representation of the child's productive language ability. The Developmental Snapshot is a parent report questionnaire that includes 52 age-ordered yes-no questions and provides parents with an estimate of their child's developmental age regarding overall receptive and expressive language skills. It is designed for parents of children from 2 months to 36 months of age and can be completed in fewer than 10 minutes.
LENA Foundation linguists and speech-language pathologists (SLPs) created the Developmental Snapshot over a six-month period. Initially, our team reviewed numerous standard language and cognitive assessments and developed a core set of questions that are most indicative of developmental age and easy for parents to fill out. Over 300 families in the Denver-metro area contributed to the creation of the Developmental Snapshot. Parents completed early versions of the assessment along with other widely used questionnaires such as the Child Development Inventory (CDI) and the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories (MCDI). Participant children were also evaluated by a certified SLP using standard assessments such as the REEL-3, PLS-4, and CAT/CLAMS. The final version of the Developmental Snapshot retains the 52 questions that provided the most consistent information about developmental age. The assessment performs very favorably when compared with the longer standard assessments tested, as estimates of developmental age based on the Developmental Snapshot correlated very well with those from the standard assessments. It is also a reliable assessment tool; when parents complete the Developmental Snapshot and then repeat it one month later, scores from one month to the next are very highly correlated, and developmental age estimates increase by approximately one month.
Thousands of parents and professionals across the country have used the Developmental Snapshot, and many have provided extremely positive feedback. Parents are excited to track their child's progress over time, and clinicians are pleased with its reliability and validity compared to assessments they use in the clinic. Given the tool's ease of use, automatic scoring, accelerated completion time and Internet compatibility, we believe that the Developmental Snapshot has strong potential as a universal screening tool. Research has shown that early identification is a key component to maximizing the effectiveness of intervention. Recognizing the importance of early intervention, Obama's initiative calls for universal screening so that children and families can get the special support and resources they need as early as possible. We believe that the Developmental Snapshot will become an important part of his early childhood intervention initiative and encourage all parents to take advantage of the online opportunity.
If you are an SLP or other speech-language professional and would like more information on the development and use of the Developmental Snapshot, we encourage you to view a webinar by Kim Coulter, the foundation's manager of training and professional development. Sign up to view presentation here.
