Multilingual children with speech sound disorders : position paper

Abstract

Individuals and societies benefit when children are supported to become competent communicators. Most children learn to speak one, two, or multiple languages competently. However, not all children learn to communicate effectively and intelligibly, and some have speech sound disorders. Some children have difficulty communicating regardless of whether they speak one, two, or multiple languages. Families, communities, educators, and speech-language pathologists (SLPs) have critical roles to play in supporting children’s speech and language acquisition. Early intervention can ameliorate speech sound disorders in children and can reduce the potentially adverse educational, social and occupational outcomes of communication impairment (Law, Garrett, Nye, & Dennis, 2012).