Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Teaching grammar to school-aged children with Specific Language

Impairment using Shape Coding

Susan Ebbels
Moor House School & College

Corresponding author:
Susan Ebbels
Moor House School & College,
Mill Lane,
Hurst Green,
Oxted,
Surrey,
RH6 8QR
UK

Tel: 01883 712271

[email protected]

1
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Teaching grammar to school-aged children with Specific Language

Impairment using Shape Coding

Abstract

This paper describes an approach to teaching grammar which has been designed for

school-aged children with SLI. The approach uses shapes, colours and arrows to make

the grammatical rules of English explicit. Evidence is presented which supports the

use of this approach with older children with SLI in the areas of past tense

morphology, comprehension of dative structures and comparative questions. I

conclude that there is sufficient evidence that this kind of intervention can be

efficacious with these older children. This challenges the current move to reduce

direct intervention for school-aged children.

2
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Teaching grammar to school-aged children with Specific Language

Impairment using Shape Coding

I Introduction
Specific Language Impairment (SLI) is estimated to affect approximately 7% of

children (Leonard, 1998; Tomblin et al., 1997) and persists into adolescence (Aram,

Ekelman, & Nation, 1984; Beitchman et al., 1996; Stothard et al., 1998; Johnson et

al., 1999), yet studies of intervention for school-aged children are very few, especially

for children in Key Stage 2 or above (over 7 years). Only a few published intervention

studies exist which not only involve children with SLI of this age, but also provide

evidence of improving language abilities and include experimental control which

allows us to determine whether any change is likely to be due to the intervention

rather than general maturation or other events in the child’s life.

Children with SLI have difficulties with many areas of language. However, as a group

they show disproportionate difficulty with some areas, performing worse than

typically developing children matched on vocabulary level or mean length of

utterance. This is particularly the case in the area of verb morphology (e.g., Leonard,

McGregor, & Allen, 1992; Rice, Wexler, & Cleave, 1995; Rice & Wexler, 1996;

Oetting & Horohov, 1997; van der Lely & Ullman, 2001) and has also been reported

in some areas of syntax, including the comprehension passive sentences (Bishop,

1979; van der Lely & Harris, 1990; van der Lely, 1996) and formation of wh-

questions (Leonard, 1995; van der Lely & Battell, 2003).

3
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

However, intervention studies focussing on these areas, particularly for school-aged

children, are remarkably sparse. In the area of verb morphology, two studies focus on

decreasing omissions of the auxiliary ‘is’ (Leonard, 1975; Ellis Weismer & Murray

Branch, 1989), while two others include a range of verb morphology targets amongst

an array of other targets (Camarata & Nelson, 1992; Nelson et al., 1996) but do not

evaluate the change in scores on these in particular. In the area of syntax, a few

studies have targeted question formation or comprehension (Wilcox & Leonard, 1978;

Ellis Weismer & Murray Branch, 1989; Ebbels & van der Lely, 2001; Spooner, 2002)

and one has targeted comprehension of passives (Ebbels & van der Lely, 2001). No

other studies with school-aged children were found which focus specifically on verb

morphology or syntax.

II Background and Rationale for using visual coding to teach grammar

Intervention studies with younger pre-school children with SLI have frequently used

methods that teach language implicitly (e.g., Ellis Weismer & Murray Branch, 1989;

Camarata & Nelson, 1992; Camarata, Nelson, & Camarata, 1994; Nelson et al., 1996;

Fey et al., 1993; 1997), assuming that the children will be able to learn the rules of

language in the normal way if the frequency and salience of target forms are

increased. However, the persisting language difficulties of older school-aged children

with SLI may reflect a difficulty with learning language implicitly, suggesting they

may require a different approach. Indeed a recent study involving older children with

SLI (Bishop, Adams, & Rosen, 2006) found that repeated responding to spoken

sentences (whether acoustically modified or not) did not lead to improved

4
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

comprehension of reversible sentences such as actives and passives. Therefore, the

current study teaches language explicitly.

Explicit approaches for teaching syntax to children with SLI often use visual coding.

These approaches assume that children with SLI have visual strengths and can be

taught language through these strengths. The first reports of such an approach with

children with SLI were by Lea ('The Colour Pattern Scheme', 1965; 1970), although

such methods had been used with children without SLI at the beginning of the 20th

century (Montessori, 1918). Several other approaches to teaching children with SLI

incorporate the idea of colour coding ('Language through Reading', Conn, 1973;

Zwitman & Sonderman, 1979; 'Colourful Semantics', Bryan, 1997; 'Spotlights on

Language Communication System', Kaldor, 1999; 2001; 'Language through Colour',

Gap House School, 2005, in press). Shapes have also been used to teach language to

children both without SLI (Montessori, described in Polk Lillard, 1972) and with SLI

(Redmayne, 1998; Kaldor, 1999; 2001).

Despite the number of approaches using visual coding which exist, very few studies

have been carried out investigating their efficacy. Zwitman and Sonderman (1979)

found that using picture cards with coloured dots to show sentence order was effective

at improving the use of two to four word combinations by children with SLI aged 3;4-

4;4. Three reports describe case studies using the Colourful Semantics method (Bryan,

1997; Spooner, 2002; Guendouzi, 2003). Bryan’s (1997) original study showed a

child’s age equivalent score on a simple test of expressive language improved by 12-

18 months after only three months of intervention. Spooner (2002) showed progress

on formal language tests in two children while Guendouzi (2003) studied two children

5
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

with SLI and found that one made some progress in expressive language while the

other did not. However, none of these case studies include experimental control and it

is therefore difficult to know how much of the progress was directly related to the

specific intervention method.

The approaches described above are all limited to basic sentence structures. While this

may be adequate for younger children with SLI, some older children need work on

structures such as wh-questions, passives, conjunctions, tense, aspect and noun-verb

agreement. None of the above systems are able to illustrate all of these structures. For

this reason, I developed the ‘Shape Coding’ system, which takes features of some of

the approaches discussed above and extends them, in order that more complex

structures and verb morphology can be shown using one visual coding system. The

‘Shape Coding’ system is most closely related to the Colour Pattern Scheme (Lea,

1970) and Colourful Semantics (Bryan, 1997). The Colour Pattern Scheme focuses on

the surface structure of a sentence and colour codes the parts of speech (e.g., Noun,

Verb, Adjective), whereas Colourful Semantics focuses on thematic roles (e.g., Agent,

Theme, Location). However, both systems underline words or groups of words with

colours and thus could not be combined in a straightforward manner. Therefore I kept

colours for parts of speech and used shapes for coding phrases according to their role

and position in sentences.

The main advantage of ‘Shape Coding’ over systems which only use colours is that

shapes can be placed inside each other, thus showing the hierarchical structure of

language. Also, shapes can easily be moved around, making it possible to show the

6
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

children how to form questions and passive sentences. This enables complex language

(as well as simple structures) to be made visually explicit.

III Overview of Shape Coding system

The Shape Coding system aims to represent visually the major linguistic features of

English. Thus, different aspects of the system can be used to teach children a range of

grammatical rules of English. When teaching the children, only those aspects of the

system which are essential to explain each rule are used.

1 Syntactic Structure

The Shape Coding system underlines individual parts of speech (e.g., noun, verb,

adjective) with the basic colours of the Colour Pattern Scheme, with a few alterations

and the addition of new colours for determiners and conjunctions (see Table 1).

Table 1: Parts of speech and their colours in the Shape Coding system

C o lo u r P art of S p eech E x a m p le s Comment [SE1]: Note that prepositions

and verbs have swapped colours in recent
R ed N o u n / P ro n o u n s b o y , ta b le , I versions
P in k D e t / P o s s e s s iv e p ro n o u n s th e , a , m y
Y e llo w V e rb p u s h , m e lt
G re e n A d je c tiv e h a rd , sa d
B lu e P re p o s itio n in , th ro u g h
P u rp le C o o rd in a tin g c o n ju n c tio n a n d , b u t, o r
O ra n g e S u b o rd in a tin g c o n ju n c tio n b e c a u s e , if

Each of these parts of speech can head a phrase which is grouped with a shape (e.g.,

Noun phrase – ‘the BOY’ = oval, Verb phrase – ‘THROWS the ball’ = hexagon,

Prepositional phrase – ‘IN the box’ = semicircle, Adjective phrase – ‘BIGGER than a

cat’ = cloud). The different shapes correspond to different kinds of phrases and each is

linked with a) a question such as Who/What, What doing, Where and What like / How

feel, b) a symbol (Widget Software Ltd, 1999) to represent these questions and c) a

7
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

colour according to the part of speech which heads the phrase; examples are shown in

the Appendix. For example, a Prepositional phrase is surrounded by a semi-circle and

is linked with the question ‘Where’ and contains a ‘blue word’ (preposition). Verb Comment [SE2]: Note that prepositions
have changed to yellow in more recent
versions
phrases consist of a main verb (or ‘yellow word’) and any noun and prepositional Comment [SE3]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions
phrases which follow it (e.g., “pushing the box”, “rolling down the slope”, “putting

the ball in the box”, “giving the girl the ball”). The whole Verb phrase is surrounded

by a hexagon and is linked with the question ‘What doing’. Noun phrases have

different shapes according to whether they are ‘internal’ or ‘external’ arguments, i.e.,

whether they are inside another phrase (e.g., push THE BOX, where THE BOX is

internal to the Verb phrase) or whether they stand alone (e.g., THE GIRL pushed the

box, where THE GIRL is external to the Verb phrase).

The distinction between external and internal arguments is important, as it allows the

system to distinguish between passive versus active sentences and Subject versus

Object questions. Both external and internal arguments can answer the questions of

‘Who’ or ‘What’; their shape does not depend on animacy, but on their position in the

sentence. Therefore all of the following sentences have the same shape ‘template’ as

that shown in Figure 1a:

I John hit the car

II The car hit John

III John hit Fred

IV The car hit the wall

8
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Figure 1: a) basic sentence template: external argument + verb phrase (including

internal argument), b) sentence templates including prepositional phrases or adjectival
phrases (with an internal argument), c) coding of auxiliaries and modals

a) John hit Fred

b) John ran to the shop

John drove the car to the shop

c) John is driving is John driving ?

John can drive can John drive ?

An internal argument can also appear inside prepositional phrases as in the examples

in Figure 1b.

Auxiliaries and modals are coded with a diamond. It is important to keep these

separate from the main verb, as they do not appear together in questions; only the

auxiliary/modal (diamond) is moved to the front of the sentence (see Figure 1c).

2 Verb morphology

Verb morphology is indicated in the Shape Coding system using a series of arrows.

Tensed verbs have vertical arrows going down from the yellow line which underlines Comment [SE4]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

9
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

the verb. Present tense verbs have an arrow in the middle of the line and past tense

verbs an arrow at the left hand end of the line (see Figure 2a for examples).

Figure 2: Verb morphology: a) coding for finite verb tenses (all lines would be in
yellow), b) coding for present and past participles Comment [SE5]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

a)
Bare form Simple past Present

walk walked walks

eat ate eats

b)
Present participle, requires tensed form of “be” to show tense

is eating was eating

Past participle, requires tensed form of “to have” to show tense

has eaten had eaten

The coding system for participles aims to represent their basic meaning. The present

participle (e.g., ‘eating’) has a zig-zag line under the ‘–ing’, representing the

continuous nature of the action. The past participle (e.g., ‘eaten’) has an arrow

pointing left to represent its past meaning, but the arrow is horizontal, not vertical

indicating that it does not carry tense. For examples of the coding of participles see

Figure 2b.

Using the Shape Coding system, it is possible to teach grammatical rules to children

with SLI. For example, they learn that ‘every sentence must have a down arrow’ (a

10
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

tensed verb). Therefore sentences such as ‘he going home’ and ‘he eaten it’ are

ungrammatical. By coding such erroneous sentences, therapists / teachers can show

the children that they do not contain a ‘down arrow’ and that therefore one needs to be

added by inserting an auxiliary verb (‘diamond’) which does.

3 Noun-verb agreement

The Shape Coding system shows noun-verb agreement by using double coloured lines

under plural nouns and verbs. Therapists / teachers can therefore teach the children

that the number of red lines in the oval (external argument) must match the number of

yellow lines in the diamond (auxiliary). This is particularly useful for helping the Comment [SE6]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

children see that a plural auxiliary is needed where two coordinated nouns are in the

subject position, e.g., ‘the man and the lady are talking’. I have noted in the course of

my clinical work that many children with SLI use the singular auxiliary with

coordinated noun subjects, presumably because they are only making the auxiliary

agree with the noun just before the auxiliary “the man and the lady is talking”. In

order to explain agreement with coordinated noun phrases, it is necessary to use both

the oval and diamond shapes and the red and yellow lines, because although ‘man’ Comment [SE7]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

and ‘lady’ are both singular, in total, there are two red lines inside the oval (see Figure

3).

11
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Figure 3: Noun-verb agreement (black = red, grey = yellow) Comment [SE8]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

The man is talking

The men are talking

The man and the lady are talking

The system can also be used to teach children about the 3rd person singular –s by

explaining that when a he, she or it is followed by a ‘yellow word’ with a ‘down Comment [SE9]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

arrow’ ‘in the middle’, they have to add an ‘s’.

IV Introducing Shape Coding to children with SLI

The full Shape Coding system is complex in order to be flexible enough to capture the

complexity of the English language. Therefore, introducing it to children with SLI

may seem daunting. However, it is important to bear in mind that children are only

introduced to those parts of the system which are necessary for explaining the

particular rule which is being targeted at any one time.

If I have decided that a child may benefit from Shape Coding, I first identify which

areas of grammar he/she needs to work on, then work out an order in which to teach

them. This is based on criteria such as typical age of acquisition, relatedness to other

structures which need to be taught, possible effect on the child’s functioning in the

12
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

classroom and whether the child can be paired or grouped with other children who

need work on similar structures. Then, if the child is unfamiliar with the system I

introduce the basic system in the way described below (often with groups of children).

After they understand the basics of the system, they are ready to start on those

structures where they have particular needs.

When introducing Shape Coding to children with SLI, I first aim to establish the link

between the shape and the question word; the colour is secondary at this stage. I begin

by using laminated ‘Who/What’ and ‘What doing’ shapes (oval and hexagon) and ask

the children to give me a name to go in the ‘Who’ shape and an action to go in the

‘What doing’ shape. I then either write these in or draw a picture with removable

white board pens on the back of the shape (for examples of the shapes see the

Appendix). The children can then ‘read’ their sentence. To reinforce the link between

questions and shapes, I turn the shape over to reveal the question word and ask the

relevant question (e.g., WHO is running?) and then get them to turn over the relevant

shape to find the answer on the back (e.g., Sam). In the very first session, I introduce

the fact that a shape can contain more than one word, by encouraging the children to

put noun phrases in the ‘Who/What’ shape (e.g., ‘the boy’, or ‘my mum’) and verb

phrases in the ‘What doing’ shape (e.g., ‘riding a bike’). I always stress that the shape

goes around all the words in an answer, therefore if the answer to ‘What is he doing?’

is ‘riding the bike’, then the hexagon goes all around all three words ‘riding the bike’.

If the children know from the beginning that more than one word can go in a shape,

the system immediately becomes more flexible. Indeed, this is the main advantage of

the system. For this reason, colour is backgrounded to start with, as the coloured lines

belong under individual words. Early exercises include drawing shapes around written

13
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

sentences, identifying shape templates for spoken sentences and creating sentences for

shape templates, either orally or written. To reinforce the meaning of the shapes, I

give exercises where the shape changes according to the meaning, for example, ‘John

is sleeping’ versus ‘John is tired’, where ‘sleeping’ goes in a hexagon as it tells you

‘What doing’, while ‘tired’ goes in a cloud as it tells you how someone feels.

As the next step, I introduce the fact that an oval answers questions of ‘Who’ or

‘What’, e.g., ‘the boy is small’ and ‘the house is small’ use the same shape template

(oval, diamond, cloud). Similarly, a rectangle also answers questions of ‘Who’ or

‘What’, but belongs inside other shapes, as in the examples in Figures 1a and 1b.

The next steps would depend on the focus of the therapy which the individual child

requires, whether they need work on for example, verb argument structure, question

formation, sentence comprehension, verb morphology etc. Having chosen which area

to focus on, only those features of the Shape Coding system which are necessary for

explaining and teaching that area are used. All other features are ignored until they are

needed for teaching another area of language.

V Applications of Shape Coding and evidence for its effectiveness

The Shape Coding system can be used to teach children with SLI a wide range of

grammatical rules in the areas of argument structure, syntax and morphology. In this

section, I will discuss some of the ways the system can be used and any evidence for

its effectiveness in each area.

14
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

1 Vocabulary and argument structure

In order to be able to use a new item of vocabulary productively, children need to

know its phonology, morphology (e.g., whether it is a plural noun or particular verb

form), semantics and syntax (both its part of speech and its argument structure). The

Shape Coding system cannot be used for phonology, but it can be used to aid teaching

in the other three areas. In terms of morphology, plural nouns or verbs can be

indicated using double lines, and verb tenses and participles can be indicated using the

arrow coding systems shown in Figure 2. The Shape Coding system is of limited use

in teaching semantics, but it can be used to aid the comprehension of multiple

meanings where they are different parts of speech. For example, the word ‘light’

could be a noun (red), adjective (green) or verb (yellow). Once the children know the Comment [SE10]: Note that verbs have
changed to blue in more recent versions

‘colour’ of a new word, if they have learned the connection between colour and shape

in the system, they should be able to begin to use shape templates to make sentences

with the new words.

However, if the word is a verb, they also need to know its argument structure in order

to use it correctly in a sentence. Indeed sentences are built around verbs and their

argument structures (Chiat, 2000) and thus difficulties with verbs and their argument

structures will lead to sentence production difficulties. Verbs have a range of

argument structures and some verbs can have more than one argument structure, for

example:

He is sleeping Verb

He is eating (an apple) Verb + optional Noun Phrase (NP)

He is lighting the fire Verb + NP

15
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

He is pouring water on the fire Verb + NP + Prepositional Phrase (PP)

He is filling the bucket (with water) Verb + NP + optional PP

He is giving the girl the ball Verb + NP (recipient) + NP

He is giving the ball to the girl Verb + NP + PP (recipient)

The Shape Coding system can show each of these argument structures using different

shape templates and when children learn a new verb, if they also learn its

corresponding template(s), they will then be able to use it accurately in a sentence.

This is important, as some studies have found that children with SLI omit more

obligatory arguments than age controls (Thordardottir & Weismer, 2002), MLU

controls (Watkins & Rice, 1991) and vocabulary controls (Ebbels, 2005). They also

use the incorrect argument structure for verbs such as ‘fill’, where the object (e.g.,

‘the bucket’) changes state, not location (Ebbels, 2005), saying for example: the lady

is filling the sweets into the jar, the girl is building the bricks and the lady is covering

the scarf on her head. In a randomized control trial Ebbels, van der Lely and Dockrell

(2006, submitted) showed Shape Coding can improve the performance of children

with SLI in their use of argument structure, reducing both omissions of obligatory

arguments and also their use of the incorrect argument structure with verbs like ‘fill’.

2 Study 1 - Comprehension of dative form

Children with SLI have been found to have difficulties understanding the two

constructions (dative versus prepositional) involved in verbs such as ‘give’ (van der

Lely & Harris, 1990). I have used the Shape Coding system to help three children

understand these constructions. These children were all involved in the study by

Ebbels and van der Lely (2001) and showed significant progress with passives and

16
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

wh-questions (see below). They were 11 to 12 years old at initial testing and 12 to 14

at the time when they received therapy targeted at the dative construction. All had

severe receptive and expressive difficulties (see Table 2) but normal visual perceptual

skills as measured on the Test of Visual Perceptual Skills (Gardner, 1988).

Table 2: Standard Scores on standardized tests

T est P a r tic ip a n ts
RU JD DG
C E L F -R : R e c e p tiv e L a n g u a g e 54 50 59
C E L F -R : E x p r e s s iv e L a n g u a g e 54 59 59
TROG 65 <65 65
BPVS 50 50 68
T e s t o f V is u a l-P e r c e p tu a l S k ills 109 111 112

The children’s comprehension of the dative and prepositional form were tested using

an acting out task with a variety of animals using the verb give, initially once a week

for four weeks and then once every school term. They were given six sentences in the

prepositional form (e.g., ‘the cow is giving the pig to the sheep’) and six sentences in

the dative form (e.g., ‘the cow is giving the pig the sheep’). The most common error

was that when they were asked to act out sentences in the dative form such as ‘the

cow is giving the pig the sheep’, they tended to make the cow give the pig to the

sheep, i.e., they seemed to understand the dative form as if it were the prepositional

form ‘the cow is giving the pig to the sheep’.

During the first year of the study, the children received therapy on passives and ‘wh’

questions (see Ebbels & van der Lely, 2001). Two children (RU and DG) then

received one school-term of intervention (Autumn term of year 2) targeting dative

comprehension, while the other (JD) received intervention targeting comprehension of

17
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

comparative questions (see below). JD then received intervention targeting

comprehension of datives in the following Spring term of year 2.

a Method

The Shape Coding system was used to show the children the meaning of the two

forms of the dative. They were taught the two sentence templates associated with the

prepositional and dative forms (see Figure 4). The recipient had the same shape in

each of the templates, so that they could learn that the noun in the semi-circle receives

the noun in the rectangle.

Figure 4: Shape Coding templates for the dative and prepositional forms.

The cow is giving the pig to the sheep

The cow is giving the pig the sheep

Initially, the focus was on the prepositional form as the children had relatively good

comprehension of this form. I taught them that the animal in the oval does the action,

the one in the rectangle moves and the one in the semi-circle receives the one in the

rectangle. A selection of toy animals was placed on the table and the shape template

drawn on a piece of paper. Then, when the children heard a sentence, they had to

place the correct animal in the correct shape to match the sentence they heard and

repeat back the sentence. Then, after they had placed the animals in the shapes, they

carried out the action described by the sentence. The child and I took turns to take on

the different roles of creating and acting out the sentences. In this way, I could model

18
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

for the child how to use the shape template to correctly act out the sentence and the

child could take on the role of ‘teacher’, correcting me for any ‘mistakes’.

When the child had grasped the principles of the shape template for the prepositional

form, the template for the dative form was introduced. I told the child that this

sentence type means the same thing, but when no ‘to’ is present (e.g., in ‘give the pig

the cow’) the order of the semi-circle and rectangle swap, so they have to listen very

carefully for the ‘to’. For the next few sessions, the child was given a choice of the

two sentence templates in Figure 4. I would say a sentence which matched one of the

templates and the child had to choose which template was used. Then, they placed the

animals in the correct shapes on the correct template and only then acted out the

sentence, remembering that the animal in the rectangle moves and the one in the semi-

circle receives. Again, therapist and child frequently swapped roles. Later sessions

consisted of turning over the piece of paper so that the child could not see the

templates, but they were asked to picture them in their mind before acting out the

sentence. Then, before the therapist gave feedback on whether they had acted out the

sentence correctly or not, they had to turn over the piece of paper containing the

templates and decide for themselves whether they had carried out the correct action.

The number of sessions at each stage depended on the response of the child; they did

not progress to the next stage until they were accurate with the previous stage, thus

some children progressed through the therapy quicker than others.

19
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

b Results and Discussion

Table 3 shows the results for the three participants RU, JD, DG. RU and DG received

therapy targeting this area in the Autumn term of year 2, while JD received it in the

Spring term. The post-therapy score for each child is highlighted in the table.

Table 3: Percentage correct for comprehension of dative and prepositional forms

P a r tic ip a n t: RU JD DG
S c h o o l-te rm te s t p re p o s itio n a l d a tiv e p re p o s itio n a l d a tiv e p re p o s itio n a l d a tiv e
Y e a r c a rrie d o u t fo rm fo rm fo rm fo rm fo rm fo rm
1 A u tu m n (w k 1 ) 100 0 100 33 33 17
1 A u tu m n (w k 2 ) 67 17 100 0 83 50
1 A u tu m n (w k 3 ) 100 0 100 0 100 17
1 A u tu m n (w k 4 ) 100 0 100 0 67 17
1 e n d o f A u tu m n 67 0 100 0 33 33
1 e n d o f S p rin g 83 0 100 0 100 33
1 end of S um m er 100 0 100 0 100 67
2 s ta rt o f A u tu m n 100 0 100 0 83 33
2 e n d o f A u tu m n 100 100 100 0 83 33
2 e n d o f S p rin g 100 100
M e a n p re -th e ra p y 90 2 100 4 75 33
P o s t-th e ra p y 100 100 100 100 83 33

It is clear from Table 3 that prior to therapy, RU and JD had good comprehension of

the prepositional form and no real understanding of the dative form. 2-tailed

Wilcoxon matched samples tests for both children showed that this difference

between the two forms was significant both for RU (T=0, n=8, p=0.009) and JD (T=0,

n=9, p=0.004). Because their pre-therapy scores are not normally distributed, it is not

possible to carry out a t-test, but it is clear that they made excellent progress with

intervention as their post-therapy scores on both forms were 100%, while before

therapy, they both scored 0% correct on the dative form on all but one occasion. Their

progress in this area is likely to be due to the intervention rather than any external

factors as for both children their progress was related to the time they received the

intervention, which for JD was one term later than for RU. They were both in the

20
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

same class and thus any effect on performance of classroom activities would be

expected to affect both children at the same time, which was not the case.

DG differed from JD and RU in that he showed unreliable comprehension of both the

dative and prepositional forms both prior to and after therapy. However, in line with

the other two children, his comprehension of the prepositional form pre-therapy was

still significantly better than his comprehension of the dative form (T=0, n=7,

p=0.016). His post-therapy scores did not differ significantly from his pre-therapy

scores on either the dative form (t=0.06(7), p=0.95, d=0.002) or prepositional form

(t=-0.81(7), p=0.44, d=0.29), showing that he did not benefit from the intervention in

this area. A likely reason for the different pattern of performance for DG is likely to

be auditory memory. Although robust data was not collected in this area for all three

children, DG had noticeably poor auditory memory and on informal tests was unable

to remember three items reliably in sequence. Hence, the reason for his poor

understanding of both the dative and prepositional forms is likely to be his inability to

remember the order of the three nouns present in these sentences. Indeed, during the

testing, he frequently repeated the sentence incorrectly before attempting to act it out.

It seems that Shape Coding did not aid his ability to remember the sequence of the

nouns in the sentence.

3 Study 2 – Syntax (comprehension of comparative questions)

As discussed in the introduction, several studies have found that children with SLI

have difficulties understanding passive sentences and forming wh-questions, but

therapy studies targeting these areas of syntax are virtually non-existent. Shape

Coding has been used to remediate both these areas. Ebbels & van der Lely (2001)

21
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

report on its use to teach comprehension and use of passive sentences and wh-

questions to four children. The method of coding such sentences is shown in Figure 5.

Three of the children (RU, JD & DG) showed good progress in these areas. However,

one child (FT, with good comprehension but poor production of these structures pre-

therapy) showed little improvement with Shape Coding therapy, indicating that her

difficulties may be different from the others.

Figure 5: a) coding for active and passive sentences, b) coding for wh-
questions

a)

Subject question: Who is following the horse ?

Object question:

Who is the horse following ?

b)

Active: The man eats the fish

Passive:

The fish is eaten by the man

22
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

A follow-up study showed that Shape Coding could also be used to help the children

understand comparative questions (e.g., ‘what is bigger than a cat?’ or ‘what is a cat

bigger than?’). These questions occur frequently in maths and while therapists /

teachers often focus on children’s understanding of the concept of comparison (e.g.,

bigger than, smaller than), we rarely focus on the syntax of the questions. If children

with SLI have difficulties understanding structures involving ‘movement’ (as has

been argued by van der Lely, 1998), the structure of the question may affect whether

the children can answer it correctly or not, regardless of their understanding of the

concept of comparison.

This study involved two of the three children who benefited from the therapy focused

on passives and ‘wh’ questions (JD and DG). Their understanding of comparative

questions was measured once a week for 4 weeks and then once per term during the

first year of the study (during the passive and wh-question therapy reported in Ebbels

& van der Lely, 2001), directly prior to receiving therapy on comparative questions

and then again after a term of therapy. The test consisted of twelve questions

involving the concepts of ‘bigger than’ and ‘smaller than’. Six questions were without

movement, three using ‘bigger than’ and three using ‘smaller than’ (e.g., ‘what is

bigger/smaller than a cat?’) and six questions with movement (e.g., ‘what is a cat

bigger/smaller than?’).

In order to control for other factors in their school experience, as they were in the

same class, the two children received intervention on this target at different times: JD

during the Autumn term of year 2 and DG in the Spring term.

23
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

a Method

The method used was very similar to that used in the Ebbels & van der Lely (2001)

study: movement of the wh-phrase was shown with a trace (shape with dotted line)

and an arrow joining the new location of the question word and its original location

(see Figure 6).

Figure 6: Coding for ‘wh’ comparatives question

No movement:

What is bigger than a cat ?

With movement:

What is a cat bigger than ?

The children were first introduced to the shape template for the sentence they could

understand better (i.e., the form without movement). Initially they were introduced to

comparative statements rather than questions which fitted the template (e.g., ‘a cow is

24
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

bigger than a cat’). They were then shown that the question word ‘What’ can be used

to replace the word in the oval. This was usually done by writing the words (or

drawing a picture for children with poor literacy) on the back of the laminated shapes.

Thus, the shape could be turned over to reveal the question word and turned back to

reveal the ‘answer’. I discussed with the children that many words could go in the

oval shape as many objects are bigger than a cat. One exercise therefore involved

writing (or drawing) many words on the back of the oval shape, all of which

completed a true statement. By changing the words in the rest of the sentence (e.g.,

changing ‘bigger’ to ‘smaller’ or ‘cat’ to ‘house’) the children learned to change the

objects in the oval, by rubbing out those which no longer applied and adding new

ones.

When the children had a good comprehension of how the shape template worked for

the question with no movement, I then introduced the template with movement. This

only took one session in the case of the children in this study as they had good

comprehension of comparative questions with no movement pre-therapy (see results

below and Table 4). To introduce movement, I started again with a statement (e.g., ‘a

cow is bigger than a cat’) and then showed them that the question on the back of the

rectangle was also ‘What’ and that sometimes we may want to ask about the

rectangle. When the rectangle was turned over to reveal the question word, the

sentence now read “a cow is bigger than what”). I then showed them that question

words have to move to the front of the sentence leaving a trace behind, shown as a

dotted rectangle (producing “what a cow is bigger than ____?”) and then the rule that

if a rectangle is at the beginning of a sentence, a diamond (i.e., auxiliary) has to come

second. Because a diamond is already present in the sentence (containing ‘is’), that

25
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

can move from its original position to second place, resulting in “what is a cow ___

bigger than ___?”). The concept of moving question words to the beginning of a

sentence and diamonds to the second position was already familiar to the children

from the ‘wh’ question therapy they had already carried out as part of the Ebbels and

van der Lely (2001) study.

In the next stage I gave the children the two possible shape templates to choose from

(as shown in Figure 6) and then asked comparative questions which matched one of

the forms. They had to listen carefully to the question and choose which template it

matched (for literate children this task can also be given in a written form). Having

chosen the correct template they then had to answer the question. As a check and

before they were given feedback as to the correctness of their answer, they had to turn

the question back into a statement by turning the ‘What’ shape over and replacing it

with their answer and if it was a rectangle, returning it to its original position in the

sentence and reading the resulting statement. In this way, they could see if they had

given the correct answer. In the final stages of therapy, this process was carried out

without looking at the templates at first, but afterwards using them as a check in a

similar way to that used in the dative therapy. Thus, the children learn to use the

shapes to correct their own answers rather than relying on the therapist to tell them if

they had made an error or not.

b Results and Discussion

The children’s scores on the comparative questions test are shown in Table 4, the

post-therapy scores for each child are highlighted. This shows that prior to receiving

therapy, both children had good understanding of comparative questions without

26
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

movement (e.g., ‘what is bigger/smaller than a cat?’) showing that they understood

the concepts of ‘bigger than’ and ‘smaller than’. However, their comprehension of

those questions involving movement (e.g., ‘what is a cat bigger/smaller than?’) was

significantly worse (JD: T=0, n=8, p=0.008 and DG: T=0, n=9, p=0.004).

Table 4: Percentage correct for comprehension of comparative questions

P a r tic ip a n t: JD DG
S c h o o l-te rm te s t no w ith no w ith
Y e a r c a rrie d o u t m ovem ent m ovm ent m ovem ent m ovm ent
1 A u tu m n (w k 1 ) 100 17 100 17
1 A u tu m n (w k 2 ) 100 17 100 0
1 A u tu m n (w k 3 ) 100 67 83 0
1 A u tu m n (w k 4 ) 100 33 83 0
1 e n d o f A u tu m n 100 50 100 0
1 e n d o f S p rin g 100 0 100 0
1 end of S um m er 100 67 100 0
2 s ta rt o f A u tu m n 100 33 100 0
2 e n d o f A u tu m n 100 83 100 0
2 e n d o f S p rin g 100 100
M e a n p re -th e ra p y 100 35 96 2
P o s t-th e ra p y 100 83 100 100

Their scores during the period before they received intervention targeting this

structure are of interest. DG showed consistently poor scores on questions involving

movement. However, JD showed some improvement during the Autumn and Summer

terms of the first year. This is during the time when he was receiving intervention

focused on non-comparative wh-questions (see Ebbels & van der Lely, 2001)

indicating that for him, there was some generalisation from this therapy to the

comprehension of comparative questions. However, during the periods when he was

not receiving intervention focused on wh-questions, his scores on comparative

questions decreased (although he maintained progress with standard object wh-

27
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

questions which were the direct focus of the intervention, see Ebbels & van der Lely,

2001).

A one-sample t-test showed JD’s comprehension of the questions involving

movement was significantly better after this specific intervention than before (t(7)=-

5.52, p=0.001, d=1.98). Because DG’s pre-therapy scores were not normally

distributed, it was not possible to carry out a t-test, but it is clear that he made

excellent progress with therapy, scoring 100% after therapy, whereas on all but one

previous occasion, he had scored 0%. Thus, the Shape Coding therapy was effective

at teaching comprehension of comparative questions for both children in this study.

4 Study 3 - Verb morphology (past tense)

The most common finding in studies with children with SLI is that they have

difficulties with verb morphology. These difficulties include omission of the past

tense and tensed auxiliaries (e.g., is, are, was, were) and errors of subject-verb

agreement, (e.g., omitting 3rd person –s in the present tense or using ‘was’ or ‘is’

instead of ‘were’ and ‘are’). The Shape Coding system can be used to teach children

the concepts of tense and agreement and grammatical rules governing their use. Once

they have learned these rules, the system can be used to correct the errors they have

made in their work. If the teacher / therapist marks the child’s work using the Shape

Coding symbols, the children can ‘see’ their own mistakes; this increases their

independence as they can correct their own mistakes and also understand why they are

wrong.

28
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

In the next section, I will report on a study focusing on teaching the past tense in

written work with the Shape Coding system. This was carried out with one class of 9

children with SLI aged 11-13 years. One English lesson per week was devoted to this

topic for one school term.

a Method

The children were taught to associate tense with a ‘time line’, where the present is in

the middle of the line and the past at the left hand end. A vertical arrow appeared at

the left of the horizontal line under past tense verbs and in the middle under present

tense verbs (see Figure 2a). The children were taught to identify verbs in written

sentences and then identify whether they were tensed or not and which tense they

were in. They were taught rules such as: all main clauses “must have one (and only

one) down arrow” (i.e., one tensed verb) and throughout a piece of text “the arrows

have to stay the same” (i.e., you have to maintain consistency of tense), unless you are

quoting direct speech. They were encouraged to write sentences which matched

particular patterns, check written sentences for tense errors and eventually to check

their own and others’ written work by drawing the symbols under the verbs and make

corrections if the work did not conform to the rules they had learned.

Before the intervention began, the children were asked to write about their Summer

holiday and the proportion of verbs written in the past tense (where required) was

recorded. The intervention lasted throughout the Autumn term and was delivered to

the whole class of nine children in an English lesson (one hour per week). In January

they were asked to write about their Christmas holidays and the same measure was

taken. Two of the children showed a decrease in performance and were therefore

given extra sessions in a pair and re-tested again after the February half-term.

29
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

b Results and Discussion

The results for the individual participants (A-I) are shown in Table 5. This shows that

six of the nine participants used the past tense more consistently when re-tested in

January when compared with their performance in September. One child showed little

change (participant F) and two showed a decrease in performance (A and B). For

participant B this was partly due to a very restricted use of verbs in her first sample,

where she used only 5 high frequency verbs in total. However, after six additional

half-hour sessions in a pair focusing on the same area, participants A and B showed

better performance than their original performance in September.

Table 5: Results of past tense use in spontaneous written work

P a r tic ip a n t: A B C D E F G H I M ean SD
S ept 54 80 38 43 64 71 78 82 87 66 18
Jan 50 36 55 75 91 70 85 100 100 74 23
Feb 73 92
D iffe r e n c e :
S ep t-J a n
-4 -4 4 17 32 27 -1 7 18 13 7 23
D iffe r e n c e :
S e p t-fin a l 19 12 17 32 27 -1 7 18 13 16 10

A one-tailed paired t-test comparing performance in September and January for the

whole group was not significant, despite a large effect size (t(8)= -0.96, p=0.18,

d=1.72). However, the group difference is significant with a very large effect size if

the child who used a very restricted number of verbs in her pre-therapy sample

(participant B) is removed, (t(7)=-4.46, p=0.001, d=3.70) or if all children are

included but for the two children who received additional paired therapy (participants

A and B), their February scores are used instead (t(8)= -4.46, p<0.001, d=5.88).

30
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

The results of this study show that for most children in the class, intervention in a

group targeting the past tense was effective. However, two children showed no

progress when taught with the whole class but made good progress with additional

sessions of paired work. Thus, it seems that while group work may work well for

some pupils, it is not equally effective for all. Thus, if a child does not appear to

benefit from intervention it may be worth changing the method of delivery of

intervention rather than the method of intervention itself.

VI Summary and General Discussion

The Shape Coding system is flexible enough to be used to teach a range of

grammatical rules. Studies reported in this paper and elsewhere (Ebbels & van der

Lely, 2001; Ebbels, van der Lely, & Dockrell, 2006, submitted) indicate that it can be

efficacious in teaching older children with SLI about verb argument structure, the

dative form, wh-questions (including comparative questions), passives and the past

tense. However, analyses of individual cases indicate that it is not efficacious for all

children for all these structures. The study involving the past tense showed that not all

children benefited from the system when taught in a group, but when provided with

additional therapy in a pair two children were able to improve. The child in Ebbels

and van der Lely (2001) with good COMPREHENSION of the passive and wh-

questions, showed no change in her PRODUCTION of these structures. Another child

in that study (DG) is also discussed in this paper. He made good progress with

passives and wh-questions (including comparative questions), but not with

comprehension of the dative form. I hypothesized that this was due to his difficulties

remembering the three noun phrases involved in the dative structures; all the other

31
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

structures involved only two noun phrases and thus it is possible that he was able to

remember the sentences and then use the Shape Coding system to improve his

understanding of the syntax. These studies therefore indicate that individual

differences between children can lead to different outcomes of therapy. Some children

may have additional difficulties which affect their response to therapy on particular

structures (as hypothesized for DG). Other children may require particular methods of

delivery in order to benefit from therapy as seems to be the case with the two children

in the past tense study. Therefore, therapy provision must be flexible enough to

accommodate the individual differences of children with SLI.

These mixed results point to many further avenues of research. We need to establish

which children can benefit from the Shape Coding method, in which setting (group vs

paired vs individual therapy) and for which structures. In addition, we need to

investigate whether similar methods of therapy can be effective with younger children

with SLI. I have received reports that therapists and teachers have found it to be

useful with younger age groups (Key Stages 1 and 2), but controlled studies are now

needed. With younger children, it would be even more important to use only those

parts of the system which are essential at any one time, thus avoiding unnecessary

complexity. However, the advantage of the Shape Coding method is that for those

children who are likely to have long-term language difficulties, it can be extended to

more complex structures later.

The studies reported in this paper and others (e.g., Ebbels & van der Lely, 2001;

Ebbels, van der Lely, & Dockrell, 2006, submitted) show that intervention can be

effective for secondary-aged children with SLI. This is in contrast to a recent study

32
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

(Bishop, Adams, & Rosen, 2006) which found that a computer program which

provided repeated examples of structures similar to those investigated with the Shape

Coding system (e.g., reversible sentences) and reinforcement for correct answers did

not improve the children’s comprehension of these structures. The participants in that

study were very similar to those who have benefited from use of the Shape Coding

system. Therefore, either the intervention method or its delivery are likely to account

for the very different results of that study from those reported in this paper. The

studies differed in the method of delivery (computer vs therapist) as well as the

content of the therapy. In the Bishop et al. study, although the children were informed

whether their responses were correct or incorrect, they are not given any explicit

explanation as to why. This is in contrast to the Shape Coding method, where the

therapist uses the shapes to explain to the child why they have made an error and how

to improve their performance. Given these two differences, future studies could aim to

establish which ingredients of the Shape Coding therapy are crucial to success: the

interaction with a person rather than a computer, the explicit rather than implicit

behavioural approach, or both.

The positive results reported in this paper provide evidence in favour of continuing to

provide intervention for the persisting difficulties of older children with SLI.

Unfortunately, many services (in the UK at least) provide very little and often no

therapy to children over 11 years of age (Lindsay et al., 2005; Dockrell et al., 2005, in

press). This is perhaps unsurprising given the limited evidence that intervention for

this age group is effective. However, I hope that the positive results discussed above

will encourage others to investigate intervention for other areas of language in school-

aged children.

33
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

The predominant philosophy within speech and language therapy services is to

provide intervention when the children are as young as possible, to prevent future

difficulties. While I applaud this principle, I would also argue that at present we have

no ‘cure’ for SLI and many children continue to have difficulties throughout

childhood and into their adult lives. Therefore, as long as therapy can be shown to be

effective, it should continue throughout a child’s school life and possibly beyond. The

challenge however, given limited therapy resources, is to establish the most effective

methods (and delivery) of therapy for each area of language, for each age group and

for every profile of difficulties. I hope we can collectively rise to this challenge for the

sake of all children with SLI.

Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the children at Moor House School who inspired and trialled this
research and the staff and governors for their interest and support. Thanks are also due
to Courtenay Norbury and Julie Dockrell for their comments on earlier drafts of this
paper.

References

Aram, D. M., Ekelman, B. L., & Nation, J. E. 1984. Preschoolers with language
disorders: 10 years later. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 27, 232-244.

Beitchman, J. H., Wilson, B., Brownlie, E. B., Walters, H., & Lancee, W. 1996. Long-
term consistency in speech/language profiles: 1. developmental and academic
outcomes. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
35[6], 804-814.

Bishop, D. V. M. 1979. Comprehension in developmental language disorders.

Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology 21, 225-238.

Bishop, D. V. M., Adams, C. V., & Rosen, S. 2006. Resistance of grammatical

impairment to computerized comprehension training in children specific and non-

34
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

specific language impairments. International Journal of Language & Communication

Disorders 41[1], 19-40.

Bryan, A. 1997, Colourful Semantics., in Language disorders in children and adults:

psycholinguistic approaches to therapy., S. Chiat, J. Law, & J. Marshall, eds., Whurr,
London.

Camarata, S. M. & Nelson, K. E. 1992. Treatment Efficiency As A Function of Target

Selection in the Remediation of Child Language Disorders. Clinical Linguistics &
Phonetics 6[3], 167-178.

Camarata, S. M., Nelson, K. E., & Camarata, M. N. 1994. Comparison of

Conversational-Recasting and Imitative Procedures for Training Grammatical
Structures in Children with Specific Language Impairment. Journal of Speech and
Hearing Research 37[6], 1414-1423.

Chiat, S. 2000, Understanding children with language problems Cambridge

University Press.

Conn, P. 1973, Language Therapy Invalid Children's Association, London.

Dockrell, J. E., Lindsay, G., Letchford, B., & Mackie, C. 2005, in press. Educational
provision for children with specific speech and language difficulties: Perspectives of
speech and language therapist managers. International Journal of Language and
Communication Disorders .

Ebbels, S. & van der Lely, H. 2001. Meta-syntactic therapy using visual coding for
children with severe persistent SLI. International Journal of Language &
Communication Disorders 36[supplement], 345-350.

Ebbels, S. H. 2005, Argument structure in specific language impairment: from theory

to therapy, PhD, University College London.

Ebbels, S. H., van der Lely, H. K. J., & Dockrell, J. E. 2006, submitted. Argument
structure in children with severe, persistent SLI: is intervention effective? Journal of
Speech Language and Hearing Research .

Ellis Weismer, S. & Murray Branch, J. 1989. Modeling Versus Modeling Plus Evoked
Production Training - A Comparison of 2 Language Intervention Methods. Journal of
Speech and Hearing Disorders 54[2], 269-281.

Fey, M. E., Cleave, P., Long, S. H., & Hughes, D. L. 1993. Two Approaches to the
Facilitation of Grammar in Children with Language Impairment: An Experimental
Evaluation. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 36, 141-157.

Fey, M. E., Cleave, P. L., & Long, S. H. 1997. Two models of grammar facilitation in
children with language impairments: phase 2. Journal of Speech Language and
Hearing Research 40, 5-19.

Gap House School. 2005. Language through Colour. developed at Gap House School,
Broadstairs, Kent. Contact 01843 866672 for further information.

35
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Gardner, M. F. 1988. Test of visual-perceptual skills (non-motor). Available from

Ann Arbor Publishers Ltd, PO Box 1, Belford, Northumberland, NE70 7JX.

Guendouzi, J. 2003. 'SLI', a generic category of language impairment that emerges

from specific differences: A case study of two individual linguistic profiles. Clinical
Linguistics & Phonetics 17[2], 135-152.

Johnson, C. J., Beitchman, J. H., Young, A., Escobar, M., Atkinson, L., Wilson, B.,
Brownlie, E. B., Douglas, L., Taback, N., Lam, I., & Wang, M. 1999. Fourteen-year
follow-up of children with and without speech/language impairments:
Speech/language stability and outcomes. Journal of Speech Language and Hearing
Research 42[3], 744-760.

Kaldor, C. "From visual image to Verbal and Syntactic Symbols: The Spotlights on
Language Communication System (SPOTS-ON).", Paper presentation at the AFASIC
Conference, York, 1999, for ICAN's Meath School, Ottershaw, UK. Previously
delivered at a meeting of the Special Interest Group in Developmental Cognitive
Neuropsychology, 1998, Moor House School, RH8 9AQ, UK. (Available from the
author at Meath School, Brox Road, Ottershaw, KT16 0LF or [email protected])..

Kaldor, C., Robinson, P., & Tanner, J. 2001. Turning on the Spotlight. Speech and
Language Therapy in Practice , Summer 2001; Avril Nicoll (Ed).
www.speechmag.com Paper submitted for a Poster Presentation at the Royal College
of Speech and Language Therapists' Conference, Birmingham, 2001, for ICAN's
Meath School, KT16 0LF, UK.

Lea, J. 1965. A language system for children suffering from receptive aphasia. Speech
Pathology and Therapy 8, 58-68.

Lea, J. 1970, The Colour Pattern Scheme: a Method of Remedial Language Teaching
Moor House School, Hurst Green, Surrey.

Leonard, L. B. 1975. Developmental considerations in the management of language

disabled children. Journal of Learning Disabilities 8[4], 44-49.

Leonard, L. B. 1995. Functional Categories in the Grammars of Children with

Specific Language Impairment. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 38, 1270-
1283.

Leonard, L. B. 1998, Children with Specific Language Impairment MIT Press,

Cambridge, MA.

Leonard, L. B., McGregor, K. K., & Allen, G. D. 1992. Grammatical Morphology and
Speech-Perception in Children with Specific Language Impairment. Journal of
Speech and Hearing Research 35[5], 1076-1085.

Lindsay, G., Dockrell, J. E., Mackie, C., & Letchford, B. 2005. Local Educational
Authorities' approaches to provision for children with specific speech and language
difficulties in England and Wales. European Journal of Special Needs Education 20,
329-345.

36
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

Montessori, M. 1918, The advanced Montessori Method II. The Montessori

Elementary Material Heineman, London.

Nelson, K. E., Camarata, S. M., Welsh, J., Butkovsky, L., & Camarata, M. 1996.
Effects of imitative and conversational recasting treatment on the acquisition of
grammar in children with specific language impairment and younger language-normal
children. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 39, 850-859.

Oetting, J. B. & Horohov, J. E. 1997. Past-tense marking by children with and without
specific language impairment. Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research
40[1], 62-74.

Polk Lillard, P. 1972, Montessori: A Modern Approach Schocken Books, New York.

Redmayne, C. 1998. What's the Question.

Rice, M. L. & Wexler, K. 1996. Toward tense as a clinical marker of specific

language impairment in English-speaking children. Journal of Speech and Hearing
Research 39[6], 1239-1257.

Rice, M. L., Wexler, K., & Cleave, P. L. 1995. Specific Language Impairment As A
Period of Extended Optional Infinitive. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research
38[4], 850-863.

Spooner, L. 2002. Addressing expressive language disorder in children who also have
severe receptive language disorder: A psycholinguistic approach. Child Language
Teaching and Therapy 18[3], 289-313.

Stothard, S. E., Snowling, M., Bishop, D. V. M., Chipchase, B. B., & Kaplan, C. A.
1998. Language-impaired preschoolers: a follow-up into adolescence. Journal of
Speech Language and Hearing Research 41, 407-418.

Thordardottir, E. T. & Weismer, E. 2002. Verb argument structure weakness in

specific language impairment in relation to age and utterance length. Clinical
Linguistics & Phonetics 16[4], 233-250.

Tomblin, J. B., Records, N. L., Buckwalter, P., Zhang, X., Smith, E., & O'Brien, M.
1997. Prevalence of Specific Language Impairment in kindergarten children. Journal
of Speech Language and Hearing Research 40, 1245-1260.

van der Lely, H. K. J. 1996. Specifically language impaired and normally developing
children: Verbal passive vs adjectival passive sentence interpretation. Lingua 98[4],
243-272.

van der Lely, H. K. J. 1998. SLI in Children: Movement, Economy, and Deficits in
the Computational-Syntactic System. Language Acquisition 7, 161-192.

van der Lely, H. K. J. & Battell, J. 2003. Wh-Movement in children with Grammatical
SLI: A test of the RDDR hypothesis. Language 79, 153-181.

37
 Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

van der Lely, H. K. J. & Harris, M. 1990. Comprehension of Reversible Sentences in

Specifically Language-Impaired Children. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders
55, 101-117.

van der Lely, H. K. J. & Ullman, M. T. 2001. Past tense morphology in specifically
language impaired and normally developing children. Language and Cognitive
Processes 16[2-3], 177-217.

Watkins, R. V. & Rice, M. L. 1991, "Verb Particle and Preposition Acquisition in

Language-Impaired Preschoolers", Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, vol. 34,
no. 5, pp. 1130-1141.

Widget Software Ltd. 1999. Writing with Symbols 2000.

Wilcox, J. M. & Leonard, L. B. 1978. Experimental acquisition of Wh-Questions in

language-disordered children. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 21, 220-239.

Zwitman, D. H. & Sonderman, J. C. 1979. A syntax program designed to present base

linguistic structures to language-disordered children. Journal of Communication
Disorders 12, 323-335.

38
Where?
Ebbels: Teaching Grammar using Shape Coding

APPENDIX: SHAPES, COLOURS, QUESTIONS AND SYMBOLS FOR

SHAPE CODING THERAPY
Colour Shape

Who? Oval = Noun

Red = noun Phrase (external
argument)
What?
Rectangle =
Who? Red = noun
Noun Phrase
(internal
argument)
What?

What Yellow = verb

Hexagon = Verb
Comment [SE11]: Note that verbs have
doing? Phrase changed to blue in more recent versions

Hexagon =
Blue = Preposition Prepositional Comment [SE12]: Note that
prepositions have changed to yellow in
Where? Phrase more recent versions

What like?

Cloud =
Green = Adjective Adjective
Phrase
How feel?

Variety of
phrases:
1. with + NP
2. by plus
How? No colour
progressive
verb
3. adverbial
phrase

39