Receptive & Expressive Language

 Receptive language refers to a person's ability to understand language used by others, whatever that language may be.  It takes into account understanding of the vocabulary and grammar used, as well as the ability to remember and make sense of what has been communicated.

 Expressive language refers to a person's ability to use language for communicating their needs and wants, along with socially connecting with those around them.  It involves the ability to use words and grammar to get a message across.

 Both English and Auslan have various components that need to be acquired to enable successful communication, and it is important that any difficulties in a students chosen language/s are realised and supported.

 Written Language

 Written language is a style of language that has a more formal structure and requires development of skills additional to those of the language in its spoken form. Auslan is a visual-spatial language involving movement of the body and hands along with facial expressions, and therefore cannot be written. All Deaf people need to develop skills with English in its written form, even if it is not used in its spoken form.

 Articulation (Speech)

 Speech is required for any spoken language, and articulation refers to the skill to produce speech sounds by using the lips, tongue and teeth.  It involves the ability to say sounds at the beginning, middle and end of words.

 Voice

This refers to the quality, pitch and volume of voice that is produced for speech.  It is the 'noisy' part of speech and works alongside articulation to enable production of all the sounds required for spoken English.  If voice is disordered it may require specialist care from an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist.

 Pragmatic (Social) Skills

Pragmatics refers to the social side of a language.  It involves using language appropriately for a range of intentions within different of social contexts.  People need to follow the implied 'rules' of conversational interactions to successfully communicate with those around them. 

 Phonological (Sound) Awareness

This refers to the awareness of what a sound is and typically forms a base for reading and writing.  It involves an awareness of how sounds work within words, such as rhyming, counting syllables and identification of individual sounds that letters represent.  For students who cannot hear sounds, development of phonological skills for literacy is a challenge and literacy may need to be assisted to develop in an alternative way.