Language Assessment in Multilingual Children

Children's linguistic abilities are assessed on a regular basis (e. g., upon school entry, language therapy). While a range of language tests exists for identifying specific language impairment (SLI) in monolingual children, similar tests for multilingual children are lacking. Acquisition of a second language in multilingual children differs from monolingual acquisition depending on language-biographical factors (age at onset, length of exposure). It is argued that only tests with separate norms for multilingual and monolingual children are capable of reliably differentiating typically-developing multilingual learners from those with SLI. The recently developed test LiSe-DaZ measures children's development in core grammatical areas and offers separate norms for multilingual children, which take into account the age of first exposure and the length of exposure to the target language.