Experts' recommendations for assessing multilingual children's speech in language(s) that their speech pathologist does not speak

Members of the International Expert Panel on Multilingual Children’s Speech (IEPMCS) used a 3-staged process to create recommendations for assessing multilingual children’s speech, particularly children who speak languages that are not shared by their speech-language pathologist (SLP). The 46 researchers, who worked in 43 countries and used 27 languages in professional practice, drew on international research evidence and multilingual expertise to create the recommendations. The 3-staged process involved a face-to-face one-day workshop to identify key-points, online writing, then online revisions of the paper.
This presentation outlines the recommendations within the paper including: referral, the child’s context, assessment, analysis, diagnosis, and family-centred goal-setting for multilingual children with suspected speech sound disorders. The presentation will also address SLPs’ cultural competence, working with interpreters and multicultural support workers, as well as organizational
and government barriers and facilitators to culturally competent practice.
A hypothetical case-study of an English-speaking SLP’s assessment of a multilingual Cantoneseand English-speaking 4-year-old boy will be used to illustrate the recommendations.