“Captain Grey and the Greedy Aliens” a story retell for verb production at sentence level: pilot standardization study

Background: Children with specific language impairment (CwSLI) may demonstrate difficulties with sentence production characterised by errors in use of verbs and relevant argument structures. Poor verb semantic knowledge has been linked to these sentence production weaknesses. Appropriate assessments are required to identify intervention needs in CwSLI who experience particular difficulties in acquiring and using verbs:- the omission of obligatory arguments and incorrect mapping between elements. . A story retell tool, “Captain Grey and the Greedy Aliens”, was designed to incorporate a range of semantic-syntactic verb classes and their associated argument structures with a view to clinical use in assessment of language impairments. Objectives: The current study aimed to gather normative data from typically developing (TD) children using a story retell tool, to assess the sensitivity of the tool and to identify TD patterns of verb errors. Methods: The Story Retell tool and a test of verb comprehension (ToVK), were administered to 91 TD children aged between 4;10 and 12;0 years.. Participants were audio-recorded, retelling the story with graduated prompts used when the target verbs were not produced in the narrative. Transcripts were scored for mean sentence complexity and accuracy of verb argument structure. A score for verb knowledge was derived from the ToVK. Statistical analyses explored the relationship between the key variables and age, and the influence of verb knowledge on sentence production. Results: The results showed close relationships between verb knowledge and sentence level production. A significant relationship between age and the dependent variables was identified. Ceiling effects across the older age bands were found for verb knowledge and accuracy of verb production. The majority of errors occurred on low frequency verbs. Participants <7;05 years showed particular difficulty with di-transitive verbs and optionally transitive verbs. Conclusions: Pilot data indicates Captain Grey may be a useful tool in the assessment of language impairments. Further recruitment of younger participants would be recommended to strengthen the overall reliability of the assessment tool.