After a specific checklist is returned to me, I make decisions regarding whether part of my testing will be devoted to assessment of the child’s social pragmatic language skills and if so, what type of testing will be appropriate in such case? If social pragmatic assessment is needed, the latter becomes fairly apparent after I observe the child (e.g., in the classroom, during free period) as well as during the administration of the comprehensive language testing. So what are some useful standardized and non standardized assessments of Social Pragmatic Language? There are quite a few, but for the purposes of this post, I’ll just mention some of the ones that I use on daily basis for children whose ages range from preschool through adolescence. For preschoolers ages 4 and up, the Children’s Communication Checklist-2 U.S. Edition (CCC-2) is quite useful. This 70 item norm referenced instrument (given to the parent to rate) is divided into 10 scales, 4 of which (E, F, G & H) address pragmatic aspects of communication, while another two (I & J) assess behaviors commonly impaired in children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (Bishop, 2006; 2000). For school aged children 6-12 years of age, the following standardized instruments tend to be fairly effective in teasing out social pragmatic language deficits:
