Receptive and Expressive Language Disorder

Children who struggle learning receptive and expressive language may experience difficulty forming friendships, learning at school and demonstrating their true potential.

The delay is not related to their intelligence level as often children with language disorders present with above average intelligence.

Expressive Language Difficulties

Children with developmental Language Disorders start speaking later than other children. They will often have difficulty:

learning or recalling new words
formulating simple phrases and sentences
organising words in a sentence
making sense
socialising with their peer group
developing play skills
telling simple stories
narrative skills
giving instructions
organising verbal information
expressing their feelings

Comprehension Difficulties

Does your child have difficulty understanding you?

Your child could be experiencing a receptive language difficulty if they struggle to understand instructions, answer questions correctly, understand and respond appropriately to social situations, or understand stories or conversation.

Children with Receptive Language Disorder will not develop / understand language as well as their peer group. They might appear naughty because they simply do not understand what is being said to them. Children with receptive language difficulties can often be very smart and demonstrate excellent learning skills in non-verbal assessment.

Your child could be experiencing a receptive language difficulty if they struggle to understand instructions, answer questions correctly, understand and respond appropriately to social situations, or struggle to understand stories or conversation.

At a higher level, children with receptive language difficulties can present with verbal reasoning difficulty, often miss the hidden meaning in jokes or idioms and find it hard to understand and retain the story in more complex narrative.

Receptive language difficulties can affect dynamics at home between a parent and child, socially with peers, and in school when instructions and curriculum content become difficult to follow.