Methods for studying the level of speech development of children with mental retardation

Features of mental retardation and connection with speech

All this indicates a slow rate of mental development (PDD). The disease has become quite common, which indicates the relevance of the topic of speech development in children with mental retardation, which suffers greatly.

Slow development should not be confused with incorrect and poor-quality work of parents and preschool teachers. There is a noticeable lag in the following parameters:

• memory;
• attention;
• thinking;
• emotional health.

At school, teachers can see how students with mental retardation do not show interest in the life of the class, do not participate in the lesson and do not pay attention to the teacher’s questions. Any difficulties lead to immediate cessation of activity. Children quickly get excited if they are interested in something, but they also quickly “burn out.” All this is accompanied by poor academic performance, but the meaning of grades does not play any role for the child.

All comparisons are made with accepted standards. Speech deserves special attention, since the deviation in children with mental retardation is most obvious.

Causes of delayed development

ZPR occurs in children for several reasons, which are divided into the group of biological and social.

Biological problems include problems during pregnancy that could affect the fetus. Of particular danger are poisoning by toxins, complications of toxicosis, infections and injuries. Hypoxia may occur in the fetus, asphyxia and injury during childbirth for various reasons. Prematurity and genetic predisposition are dangerous.

In the early stages of life, the developing brain and body are severely affected by:

• injuries;
• infections;
• operations;
• anesthesia and other damaging factors.

Social reasons include:

• lack of educational games and contact with people;
• unreasonable prohibitions;
• psychological trauma in early childhood and unfavorable upbringing conditions;
• overprotection;
• neglect;
• rudeness and despotism of parents.

Diagnosis of delayed development and the role of speech

The disease cannot be detected at birth and, most often, before entering kindergarten or school. It is difficult for parents to notice deviations due to the habit of their child’s behavior. He is physically and externally healthy. Emotional lag may not cause much concern, since it is believed that the baby still has to learn everything (talk, play with children).

The inability to learn new things is noted by teachers at school. But speech disorders, which often accompany mental retardation, are detected much earlier.

A preschooler’s speech is normally sufficiently developed, as is his knowledge and vocabulary, which allows him to freely communicate on any topic that he understands. Sentences are developed, interconnected and filled with the main parts of speech: verbs, pronouns, adjectives, numerals and connecting words. They are correctly connected with each other: declension, conjugation, alternation of sounds and inflection. All this is learned through communication, but not in a child with mental retardation.

Speech dysfunction is not an immediate symptom; rather, it is a consequence of delayed development. The fact is that speech is the result of thought processes that are disturbed in the patient, which means there will be problems with the speaking process. The quality of speech shows the quality of knowledge and development.

Problems arise with both impressive and expressive speech. Sensory or impressive speech is responsible for perception and understanding. If the sensory zone of the cerebral cortex, where sound images of words are stored, is disrupted, a person will hear them, but not understand them. Thus, he becomes “deaf” to speech with normal hearing.

Expressive speech also has a second name - motor. She is responsible for reproducing words. When impaired, a person utters only an unintelligible set of sounds, but at the same time understands what is being said to him. If problems are detected, it is necessary to undergo a speech examination.

With mental retardation, both forms are equally impaired, and systemic underdevelopment of speech occurs, although there are cases when one of the options predominates. The following speech characteristics are noticeable in children:

• incorrect sound reproduction;
• poor vocabulary;
• grammatical errors.

They perceive speech slowly by ear, do not understand the meaning of individual words, as well as the meaning of intonation.

It is worth paying attention if the baby speaks in primitive sentences. Not a good signal if there is no understanding of generalized words, for example, furniture, fruit, transport. The inability to conduct a monologue and difficulties with dialogical speech are also symptoms of speech impairment in mental retardation. If you look at pronunciation, the worst are hissing and whistling sounds; the overall functioning of the speech apparatus is sluggish.

It may be that the dysfunction is not very noticeable, since the child’s abilities cover everyday problems, but impairments in understanding speech, logic and grammar can still be noticed.

Ascertaining experiment

In order to determine the level of development of coherent speech in preschool children, we conducted a testing experiment on the basis of the compensatory kindergarten kindergarten No. 87 in the city of Yaroslavl.

Children from the older group took part in the experiment: an experimental group (10 people in their sixth year of life) and a control group (10 people in their sixth year of life).

We developed a methodology for examining children’s coherent speech based on the option proposed by T.I. Grizik and L.E. Tymoshchuk.

According to researchers, the formation of coherent speech should be given one of the central places in the development of a child, because Possession of a variety of coherent speech skills allows the child to fully communicate with peers and adults.

Coherent speech includes two linguistic forms - dialogue and monologue. The development of both forms plays a leading role in the process of the child’s speech development and occupies a central place in kindergarten.

As part of this experiment, the examination of coherent speech included a study of the characteristics of children's dialogical communication and narrative statements.

I. When studying dialogic communication, the speech therapist clarifies its features in specially organized conversations.

During September 2007, we held 3-4 conversations “How I spent my summer” as part of educational cycle events. The interviews were conducted in subgroups. Children participated in them at their own request. We observed each participant in the conversation and recorded the following characteristics:

Initiative. The child speaks out on his own initiative (2); at the suggestion of the teacher (1); does not protrude (0).

Topics of children's statements (games, entertainment, incidents, finds, etc.).

The ability to answer a specific question without being distracted from its content. The child answers (2); distracted (1); not responding (0).

The ability to ask questions (to the teacher). The answers of only those children who asked questions on their own initiative were recorded; children's questions were recorded.

The ability to listen to your interlocutor . We recorded how the child listened (attentively - inattentively, interrupting - not interrupting, etc.). All data was entered into the Protocol (see Appendix 3).

II. Studying the features of narrative statements.

Material for examination: pictures depicting characters from the fairy tale “Turnip”.

Examination procedure: The examination was carried out in an individual form. The teacher removed one of the pictures (for example, a picture of a dog). The rest were scattered on the table. The teacher said to the child: “Do you know the fairy tale “Turnip”? I brought pictures depicting the heroes of this fairy tale. But they got mixed up in my bag. Arrange the pictures in the order in which the characters appeared in the fairy tale “Turnip”. If the child noticed the absence of one of the characters, the teacher gave the picture. After completing the task, the teacher asked the child to retell the fairy tale.

Analysis of the results: During the study, the following characteristics were taken into account: the ability to build a sequence and the ability to recreate the sequence in a statement. The following were recorded:

Subsequence. The child laid out the pictures in the correct sequence and noticed the absence of one of the characters (2); laid out the pictures in the correct sequence, but noticed the absence of one of the characters only during the retelling (1); violated the sequence, did not notice the missing hero even during the retelling (0).

Retelling. The child retold the fairy tale in full (2); missed (confused) the sequence of events in the fairy tale (1); did not retell the fairy tale (0).

Smoothness of speech. The presence (“+”) and absence (“—”) of long pauses.

The obtained data were entered into the Protocol (see Appendix 3).

During an experimental examination of the coherent speech of children of senior preschool age with mental retardation, we identified the following features:

I. Dialogical communication:

• low initiative in dialogical communication;
• narrow topic of conversation;
• grammatical errors;
• difficulties in selecting the correct lexical units;
• inability to listen to the interlocutor.

II. Features of narrative statements:

• difficulties in correctly constructing sentences;
• children compose simple, uncommon sentences and practically do not use complex syntactic structures;
• difficulty in following the sequence of events;
• difficulties in understanding cause-and-effect relationships;
• difficulties in updating the previously read content of a fairy tale or story.

Thus, the data from the ascertaining experiment revealed a low level of development of coherent speech in children with mental retardation. The identified features confirm the need for further formation and development of both dialogic and monologue forms of speech in preschool children.

General actions for speech impairment due to mental retardation

When performing correctional work, it is important to take into account not only approaches to speech correction, but also the complex development of the child. ZPR for social reasons arises due to the constant pressure of some factor. Therefore, it is necessary to remove it, be it due to parental quarrels, inattention or severity. A child should grow up in peace.

Next, you need to create conditions in which he will learn something new. This will require the attention and time of parents, but will gradually raise the emotional and intellectual level.

Attention is paid to the speech characteristics of children with mental retardation and individual parameters are developed. For example, memory. If the child’s abilities allow, then you need to memorize short poems. This promotes understanding of narrative coherence, which is good for sensory language.

If there are problems understanding the meaning of words, then the emphasis is on explanation. Before requiring a child to use a new unfamiliar word, you need to show in practice what it means or how it works.

If you have problems with pronunciation, a series of speech therapy exercises is required.

To help your baby start speaking, you need to create a special environment. He must have an incentive to speak. To do this, you need to give as much material and content as possible so that there is something to talk about.

How to teach children with mental retardation

It is believed that it is better when children with problems are taught in special correctional institutions, or in separate classes in regular schools. But now the integrated learning method is being introduced, that is, children with mental retardation learn together, interacting with peers. Each method has its positive and negative sides.

When working on coherent speech in children with mental retardation, a teacher at any institution will have to devote additional time to repeating the material, using visual teaching aids and cards. But with severe forms of delay, the achieved result will be temporary, which is why an individual approach remains a priority.

When teaching, the material is presented in very measured doses, in small portions. Only when one stage is mastered does the complication begin. Memorization requires practice. Therefore, they often use switching from one type of activity to an adjacent one, where they can repeat or use what they have learned.

Due to rapid fatigue, classes alternate with breaks every half hour. The material for the lesson is selected in such a way as to arouse interest and emotional excitement. This requires games. The teacher's tone should be inviting and soft. It is necessary to praise the baby for successes in order to evoke a positive response.

Methods for studying the level of speech development of children with mental retardation

Methods for studying the level of speech development of children with mental retardation

In the second half of the twentieth century. Research on children's speech has received intensive development, and here a special place has been occupied by the topics of innateness, acquisition of speech-language skills and abilities, the dependence of speech development on intellectual abilities, periodization of the acquisition of the native language, and many others. etc. New methodological approaches and technical capabilities for speech research have emerged. The following scientists deal with the development and correction of speech of preschool children: Boryakova N.Yu., Volkovskaya T.N., Golubeeva G.G., Konenkova I.D., Strebeleva E.A. and others.

Under the influence of psycholinguistic ideas, the assessment of the speech of preschool children, and in particular those with mental retardation, began to be approached on the basis of assessing not only the sound side of the utterance, but the entire complex of linguistic means used by the child: lexical, morphological, syntactic, phonetic, etc. Structurally, these methods The research is reflected in the form of a level division of the child’s speech development. The most famous is the classification of levels of speech development created by Levina R. E.

Low cognitive activity of preschool children with mental retardation, a slow rate of formation of higher mental functions and weak regulation of voluntary activity inevitably lead to disturbances in various aspects of speech:

1. limited vocabulary;
2. deficiencies in the grammatical structure of speech;
3. disturbances in sound pronunciation, difficulties in phonemic perception and sound-letter analysis;
4. unconsciousness and involuntary construction of a phrase;
5. immaturity of internal programming and grammatical design of statements.

Material for studying the level of speech development of preschoolers with mental retardation must be selected, observing the basic diagnostic principles:

1. systems study;
2. A complex approach;
3. study in dynamics;
4. quantitative and qualitative analysis of results.

Diagnostic material for studying the level of speech development is grouped in the following areas:

1. communication and speech skills;
2. lexical development;
3. examination of articulatory motor skills;
4. sound pronunciation;
5. phonemic hearing;
6. syllable structure and sound content of words;
7. phonemic analysis;
8. grammatical structure of speech;
9. coherent speech.

Speech material is selected taking into account the age indicators of speech development of preschoolers. The use of the proposed materials allows us to solve the following issues:

1. take into account the characteristics of children with mental retardation;
2. draw a conclusion about the degree of formation of all aspects of speech in quantitative and qualitative terms (accounting for mistakes made, the process of completing tasks and other characteristics);
3. identify the child’s potential;
4. plan correctional developmental work in accordance with the real needs of the child;
5. implement an individual approach;
6. when compiling the results obtained in different periods, identify the dynamics and determine further directions in the work.

Studying the state of speech of preschool children with mental retardation is of great importance in the system of all correctional and developmental work; the directions of pedagogical, psychological and organization of speech therapy influence depend on its results. At the same time, the correct choice of methods plays an important role in the effectiveness (quality) of the examination: compliance with the child’s age, his psychophysical development, etc. (G. A. Volkova, L. M. Efimenkova, V. V. Konovalenko, R. I. Lalaeva, N.V. Nishcheva, G.V. Chirkina, etc.).

The examination of children's speech activity is carried out in compliance with a certain sequence of stages and includes an analysis of the main components of the speech system components. For each task, instructions are given in which children with mental retardation are shown an approximate result of the speech activity ahead of them and a way to achieve this result, that is, a sample is given. This provides an expansion of the orientation part, which is important for children with mental retardation. If there is a difficulty, the child receives help in the form of motivating or clarifying questions, context clues, repetition of instructions, and analysis of a sample.

Analysis of psychological and pedagogical literature and dissertation research indicates the diversity of organizational and content aspects of diagnosing the level of speech development of preschool children.

Volkova G.A. (1993) proposed examination schemes for children with dyslalia, dysarthria, alalia, and stuttering, and didactic material on 20 parameters for studying the psychomotor state of children with speech disorders.

Repina Z. A. (1995) reveals the methodological basis for diagnosing deviations in the development of speech in children, describes the study of the psychological basis of speech, practical functions and the psycholinguistic study of speech disorders.

Denisova N. E. writes about the effectiveness of using express diagnostics when examining children (1998); An express examination of sound pronunciation, phonemic hearing, and the sound-syllable structure of a word is offered by V. V. Konovalenko (1999).

Semago M. M., Akhutina T. V., Semago N. Ya., Svetlova N. A., Bereslavskaya M. I. (1999) in the methodological manual define the general scheme of speech therapy examination of preschoolers within the framework of PMPK, including examination of the sound side of speech , vocabulary, grammatical structure of speech, writing and reading.

Kiryanova R. A. (2004) considers complex psychological and pedagogical diagnostics of children 5-6 years old with severe speech impairments, stages and methods.

Wiesel T. G. (2005) presents a method for neuropsychological and neurolinguistic diagnostics of language function.

The textbook Geytsi E.D. “Diagnostics of children of middle and senior preschool age” (2006) contains a brief description of the diagnosis of the mental development of preschool children, including speech.

The method for diagnosing the language ability of preschool children proposed by Miklyaeva N.V. (2007) experimentally determines the components of language competence.

Kosinova E. M. (2007) developed speech therapy tests to identify the correspondence of a child’s speech development to his age.

Kabanova T.V., Domnina O.V. (2008) developed a diagnostic test that includes several areas: examination of speech, the state of general and fine motor skills in children 3-6 years old with speech disorders.

Gribova O. E. (2008) presents the technology for organizing speech therapy examinations and considers methods for examining the speech of children of preschool and primary school age.

Akimenko V.M. (2011) presents in the manual a leveled approach to diagnosing speech underdevelopment; for reliable recording of examination results, tables are offered, which significantly simplifies the reporting of a speech therapist teacher, and also allows one to trace the dynamics of correctional work.

Set by Sheremeteva E.V. “Diagnostics of psycho-speech development of young children” (a book with methodological recommendations and a computer program that helps to process and analyze diagnostic results) (2013) contains a method for diagnosing the process of speech development at an early age, allowing to identify delayed speech development, differentiate tempo variants of normal speech development and types of disorders in speech acquisition. The technique assumes:

1. a thorough study of four interrelated blocks: the natural speech environment and some aspects of microsocial conditions;
2. psychophysiological components of speech acquisition at an early age;
3. cognitive components;
4. the child’s own language production in the process of communication.

The computer program “Diagnostics of the speech development of a preschool child” (DiagLite) by O. A. Melnikova (2014), intended for diagnosing the speech development of children of senior preschool age, includes three main blocks:

1. a database that stores general information about children and their parents, anamnestic data;
2. electronic speech cards with subsequent automatic formation of an individual correctional educational route;
3. reporting documentation.

Romanovich O. A. (2014) developed an electronic manual “General Speech Development”, which is a system of work for the prevention and correction of speech disorders in preschool children, which includes:

1. defect diagnosis;
2. models of correction classes and visual and didactic material for examining the psychophysical and speech development of children with special needs and mental retardation.

The disc includes materials structured into the following sections:

• “Psycho-speech diagnostics of children 3-7 years old” (a map of the psycho-speech development of a child 3-7 years old and diagnostic tables);

• “Visual and didactic material for examination”;

• “Models of classes for children with mental retardation and special needs”;

• “System of working with parents”;

• "Presentations".

The software-indicator complex BOS "ComfortLOGO" (Ledina V.Yu., Vovk O.N.) allows for step-by-step multifactorial diagnostics of speech development, both children and adults, with automatic recording, saving and analysis of the received data, with the formation of speech cards . The use of express diagnostics does not exclude a full individual and comprehensive examination of speech; it is carried out in complex cases when making a diagnosis is difficult.

Bezrukova O. A., Nurminsky E. V., Kalenkova O. N. developed a computer program “Express diagnostics of the speech of a preschool child,” which is intended for diagnosing the speech of children 4-6 years old.

Verbitskaya T.L. offers her own technology for express diagnostics of speech development in children of senior preschool age using software tools from the Microsoft office document package to automate the diagnostic process itself, process and record the results obtained.

From the above, we can conclude that methods for studying the level of speech development of preschool children with mental retardation are varied in application and make it possible to determine the degree of development of all aspects of speech, plan correctional and developmental work in accordance with the real needs of the child and taking into account his characteristics .

How to develop sound pronunciation and speech understanding

Formation of speech in children with mental retardation is a long process. To correct and encourage the development of phonemic hearing and sound pronunciation, not only a number of exercises are required, but also preparation for them.

An articulatory warm-up is done; breathing exercises and fine motor skills exercises (for example, finger exercises) are also recommended. Such games can be accompanied by fairy tales, pictures, poems, and music.

After charging comes the main block of exercises. To develop understanding of speech, exercises with cards are used. There are several options. For example, a child might pick up a card that shows a sound that was said. Or show a word that has the specified sound. You can suggest choosing pictures that begin with the same letter.

A useful exercise is a game in which participants take turns saying words, but so that the first letter of the word coincides with the last letter of the word of the previous participant.

To correct speech, it is necessary to visit a speech therapist, who will teach you how to pronounce sounds correctly, and not just identify them.

Speech is the leading form of communication and thinking, mediated by language. Readiness for schooling includes a certain level of speech development: correct sound pronunciation, the ability to distinguish and differentiate the acoustic characteristics of sounds (voice and deafness, hardness and softness, hissing and whistling), sufficient for full communication with others, the level of formation of vocabulary and grammatical structure, the ability to logically , construct a coherent statement, speech activity. At the same time, children with mental retardation have impairments in all of these functions.

So, for example, as I.F. points out. Markovskaya [1993], impressive speech in children with mental retardation is characterized by insufficient differentiation of speech and auditory perception, inability to distinguish the meaning of individual words, and subtle nuances of speech.

The expressive speech of these children is characterized by impaired sound pronunciation, poor vocabulary, insufficient development of the grammatical structure of speech, the presence of grammatical stereotypes, agrammatisms, and speech inactivity [N.Yu. Boryakova, 1983; R.D. Trigger, 1987; E.V. Maltseva, 1990].

The speech of children with mental retardation generally develops behind the age norm and has a number of features, which include:

– low level of orientation in the sound reality of speech;

– insufficient pronunciation of whistling, hissing sounds and the sound “r”, due to sluggishness of articulation, leading to their unclear sound, distortion (weak awareness of the sound structure of the word);

– phonemic hearing and phonemic perception are not sufficiently formed - the mental action of determining the quantity, sequence, and places of sounds [L.N. Blinova, 2001].

In many cases, the picture of speech disorders indicates the presence of a general underdevelopment of speech, a delay in the process of speech development.

Children with mental retardation are characterized by insufficient inter-analyzer interaction, i.e. they have difficulty forming auditory-motor, visual-motor and auditory-visual connections. Therefore, it is difficult for them to establish a correspondence between a phoneme and a grapheme: they have difficulty determining the connection between a sound and a letter, which significantly complicates the process of learning to read and write. They are characterized by poverty, inaccuracy, and undifferentiated vocabulary. It is represented mainly by everyday, everyday vocabulary.

There are cases of misunderstanding and inaccurate use of many commonly used words: “glass” instead of “mug”, “flowers” ​​instead of “flowerbed”; mixing words with different lexical meanings, but similar in sound composition (belt - train); children do not catch the difference in the meaning of words (“embroiders” - “sews”, “waters” - “pouring”, “pouring” - “pouring”); they use words in an approximate, imprecise meaning (“garden” - “trees”, “hat” - “hat”, “peck” - “is”); they call a whole object instead of a part and vice versa (dishes - plates, shoes - shoes, dress - clothes, clothes - shirt); the name is replaced by a description of the situation or action associated with the designation of objects (kennel - “the dog lives here”, janitor - “sweeps the street”, postman - “newspapers, delivers letters”) [R.I. Lalaeva, 1992].

The vocabulary of children in this category is dominated by words with specific, well-known meanings. They mainly use categories such as noun and verb. Of the adjectives, they use mainly qualitative ones, denoting directly perceived features (color, shape, size), and have insufficient command of antonymic and synonymous means of language.

Pronouns and adverbs are not sufficiently represented in the speech of children with mental retardation. Such children slowly incorporate into their speech new words and concepts acquired during the learning process.

Children with mental retardation have an inaccurate understanding and inappropriate use of complex prepositions; in coherent speech there are agrammatisms in the form of errors in case endings (a boy pours tea in a cup), incorrect choice of form and tense of verbs (in the summer they rested and swam in the river, potatoes grew in the garden), violation of the word order in a sentence (a new mother bought a doll for her daughter ), matching errors (black shadow).

The logical construction of a coherent statement also turns out to be impaired: there is a “getting stuck” on minor details and a skipping of an important logical link, an inability to convey the sequence of events, the child easily “slips” from one topic to another [L.N. Blinova, 2001].

In addition, studies of coherent speech [I.A. Simonova, 1974, E.S. Slepovich, 1989, N.Yu. Boryakova, 1987, R.I. Lalaeva, 1992] showed that children with mental retardation have disturbances in both the semantic structure of the text and its linguistic design. At the same time, the semantic structure of the text and its internal programming suffer to a greater extent than the language design.

For example, in the work of N.Yu. Boryakova [1983] examines the peculiarities of performing tasks by children with mental retardation, requiring varying degrees of independence in the processes of programming and linguistic design of coherent speech utterances.

Experimental studies by N.Yu. Boryakova showed that retellings turned out to be the most accessible form of speech activity for children with mental retardation. However, their retellings were heterogeneous. Only a small proportion of children with mental retardation showed retellings of the second level of development, approaching the retellings of normally developing preschoolers. In these cases, the children correctly reproduced the semantic structure of the text with little help from an adult.

At the same time, the presence of a series of complex pictures activates the speech activity of children with mental retardation. However, children quickly get tired and distracted, which affects the quality of coherent speech statements.

Only 25% of children with mental retardation, according to N.Yu. Boryakova, logical and consistent stories were observed with a little help from an adult (second level). The stories of the majority of children with mental retardation were at the third level. These stories indicated that the children did not sufficiently understand the connections between individual pictures, did not establish the causes and consequences of the actions of the characters depicted, and their motives. During the story process, children often changed the logical direction of the story, did not correlate successive parts of the story with the previous content, and lost the program. There were irregularities in the transition from one program to another. A certain part of the children, in terms of the level of development of their stories, approached the level of mentally retarded children: their stories only listed some objects in the pictures.

Research by E.S. Slepovich [1978], N.Yu. Boryakova [1983] showed that the stories of children with mental retardation are significantly lower in level than the stories of normally developing children. Stories based on the plot of children with mental retardation differ in semantic content and linguistic design. Taking into account the completeness of understanding the situation, the degree of independence and the peculiarities of logic (coherence, consistency) of N.Yu. Boryakova identified 4 levels of children's stories based on the plot picture. Level I (the highest) was observed only in children with normal intelligence. Children correctly and independently identified the components of the situation depicted in the picture, established spatial, cause-and-effect relationships, created a certain model of the situation and expressed it in a story. The correct sequence and logic of presentation were noted. The absence of stories in children with mental retardation indicates insufficient development of monologue speech in children.

Some of the stories of children with mental retardation are classified as level II. The stories were characterized by a small volume, the absence of a clear program for implementing the intent of the statement, and incomplete disclosure of the semantic side of the situation. In the stories of this level, there were no distortions in the meaning of the events depicted in the picture. However, children could not reveal spatial, cause-and-effect relationships between individual components of the situation (characters, objects). A distinctive feature of the children in this group was that with some help from an adult, the children’s stories improved significantly.

Most of the stories according to the plot picture are classified as level III. Many children were unable to form a coherent description of the picture, despite the experimenter's maximum help. Most often, children only listed the objects depicted in the picture.

Characteristic of this group of children was the recording of minor details that were not important for revealing the meaning of the situation. In stories of this level there is a situational quality.

Some of the stories depicting children with mental retardation were at the lowest level (IV). Even with maximum adult help, the children could not organize a speaking program. The picture served for them only as an impetus for the emergence of side associations that did not meet the requirements of the instructions. In stories of this level there are many repetitions and children's descriptions. Some of the stories are characterized by brevity. In other cases, the volume of stories was large due to repetitions, excessive detail, and random associations.

A study of the features of stories on a given topic in children with mental retardation, conducted by N.Yu. Boryakova, showed that the most difficult things for children with mental retardation were telling independent stories on a given topic. Many children with mental retardation refused this task; the children did not know what to talk about. In other cases, they were limited to just one phrase. When composing the story, the children did not use personal experience. Instead of a story, they reproduced a series of separate statements connected by random associations. The statements in this case were amorphous, spontaneous, impulsive.

So, to summarize, we can say that children with mental retardation are characterized by various disorders and deviations in the mental, personal and speech spheres. In addition, in all types of tasks for the study of coherent speech in children with mental retardation, significant violations of text programming, the inability to subordinate speech activity to the plan, and slipping into side associations were discovered. Children with mental retardation have a delay in the development of the planning function of speech and difficulties in encoding and decoding text.

Bibliography:

1. Blinova L.N. Diagnosis and correction in the education of children with mental retardation: A textbook for pedagogical students. universities - M.: NC ENAS, 2002. - 134 p. 2. Boryakova N.Yu. On some features of the construction of speech utterances of six-year-old children with mental retardation. // Defectology. 1983. No. 3. — P.9-15. 3. Lalaeva R.I. Speech disorders in children with mental retardation. - St. Petersburg: Education, 1992. - 88 p. 4. Maltseva E.V. Features of speech impairment in children with mental retardation. //Defectology. 1990. No. 6. — P.10-18. 5. Markovskaya I.F. Impaired mental function. Clinical and neuropsychological diagnostics. - M.: Compensation Center, 1993. - 198 p. 6. Simonova I.A. Characteristics of speech in children with mental retardation. // Defectology. 1974. No. 4. — P.18-25. 7. Slepovich E.S. Speech formation in preschool children with mental retardation. - Minsk: Narodnaya Asveta Publishing House, 1989. - 64 p. 8. Triger R.D. Some features of younger schoolchildren in mastering the grammatical structure of speech. // Defectology. 1987. No. 5. — P.12-17.

How to develop grammar and vocabulary

To learn vocabulary and grammar, a child needs to master the patterns of language, phrasal speech, which is done in the process of communication, so there is no need to resort to rules and formulas, at least while the child is small and the school curriculum does not require this. Usually it is worth starting in 2nd grade.

You can learn to use endings correctly and agree on verbs in communication, gradually creating grammatical algorithms. The emphasis is on enriching vocabulary. To do this, you can ask the child to say the name of the object in the picture, and then come up with a story with it. The teacher provides assistance in this to ensure an interesting and emotional game.

Writing stories will also help with the formation of logical sentences and phrases. For the development of coherent speech, dramatization of fairy tales, games with proverbs and riddles are useful.

At any age, both schoolchildren and preschoolers must be taught to read. The volume of educational texts should not be large; it is convenient to place them on a card. The lower the reading skill, the less text on the card, down to individual syllables.

It is recommended to retell what you read using pictures, a plan, questions or without prompts. A more complex reverse option is to offer a picture or plan according to which the story is compiled.

Indicators for assessing children's statements

conclusions

Don't ignore early signs that your child is having difficulty understanding or producing speech. Attention is paid not only to the correctness of sounds, but also to the logic of the narrative, speed and compliance of the level of speech with standards at a certain age.

Defects are easier to fix when they are not running. This is done both with the help of specialists and at home, because the process of learning and correction is a game and live communication. If you have patience and desire, every adult can work with a child.

Work should be based on games and regular repetition of even the smallest details. The process of cognition and learning should not end, because it is multi-stage. There will always be areas where you can improve or make the task more difficult. During classes, the child should feel comfortable, the material should arouse his interest, but not negative emotions.

Exercise 1

Target

This task is to identify children’s abilities to reproduce a literary text that is small in volume and simple in structure.

Procedure

The first task was as follows: the children were asked to listen to a short literary work (L.N. Tolstoy’s story “The Lion and the Mouse” (see Appendix). The text of the work was read twice; before re-reading, instructions were given to compose a retelling.

table 2

Evaluation of results

Each indicator is assessed separately using a 4-point system.

Mission Success Rate

Task 2

Target

This task is to identify children’s abilities to compose a coherent plot story based on the visual content of successive fragments-episodes.

Procedure

. The pictures (from G.A. Kashe’s manual “We’ve finished playing!”) were laid out in the required sequence in front of the child, and he was asked to look at them carefully. The compilation of the story was preceded by an analysis of the subject content of each picture in the series with an explanation of individual details of the depicted situation. In case of difficulties, in addition to guiding options, a gestural indication of the corresponding picture or specific detail was used.

Table 3

Evaluation of results

Each indicator is assessed separately using a 4-point system.

Mission Success Rate

the same (see task No. 1)

Task 3

Target

This task is to identify children’s abilities to compose a coherent descriptive story based on a model of an object (toy), which fully and accurately represents the main properties and details.

Procedure

. The child is asked to carefully examine the toy (doll or car) for a few minutes, and then write a story about it using the given question plan. For example, when describing a doll, the following instruction is given: “Tell me about this doll: what is its name, how big is it; name the main parts of the body; tell me what she’s made of, what she’s wearing, what’s on her head,” etc. The sequence of displaying the main qualities of the object in the description story can also be indicated.

Table 4

Evaluation of results

Mission Success Rate

the same (see task No. 1)