Speech and language inventory for first-grade Samoan children

The Education of All Handicapped Children Act, Public Law 99-457, requires that assessment materials and procedures be provided and administered in the language or other mode of communication in which the child is most proficient. American Samoa is a territory of the United States, and its citizens are guaranteed the same privileges afforded other American citizens. However, presently there are no speech-language assessment instruments with norms in the Samoan language. In response to this deficit, Wallace and Tilo (1990) developed the O le Suega Tofotofo Samoa A le Tautala Ma Gagana (O le STS). The inventory is based on the Fluhary Preschool Language Screening Test,/u> (1978). This study was designed to determine the correlation between teacher rating of first-grade children's speech/language skills and obtained scores on the O le STS. Results were that for comparison between teacher rating and subtest performance, none of the correlations were significant at the .05 level. Speculations regarding reasons for the findings include homogeneity of the population sampled and cultural perceptions of impairment which may have influenced teacher rating.