What psychological tests are appropriate for apraxic children?
Most standard IQ exams are designed for children who do not possess any language or motor impairments. If someone has an overt specific language impairment, standard IQ testing will produce misleading estimates of intellectual functioning because of the verbal loading of instructions and the verbal nature of the tasks required. Many researchers agree that the performance of language impaired children on verbal IQ tests is hampered by poor communication skills and thus a standard IQ test may yield a biased assessment of the child’s general cognitive abilities (Swisher, Plante and Lowell (1994), Francis, et. al. (1996)). In particular, apraxic children will often score low on the verbal subtests of a standard IQ exam due to word finding problems and other expressive delays associated with apraxia. While use of a single standard (verbal) IQ exam with an apraxic child is problematic, there are at least two alternative testing strategies. The best alternative strategy depends both on the go
