title: Motor proficiency of 6- to 9-year-old children with speech and language problems.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This study compared the gross motor skills of school-age children (mean age 7 y 8 mo, range 6-9 y) with developmental speech and language disorders (DSLDs; n=105; 76 males, 29 females) and typically developing children (n=105; 76 males, 29 females). The relationship between the performance parameters and the children's age was investigated as well as the role of the type of DSLD.
  
  
  METHODS
  The children with DSLDs were classified by their schools' speech and language therapists into three subgroups: children with speech disorders (n=16), those with language disorders (n=41), or those with both (n=48). They were tested with the Test of Gross Motor Development, 2nd edition.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Compared with their typically developing peers, all three DSLD subgroups scored lower on the locomotor (all p values<0.001) and object control sub tests (all p values<0.001). Significant performance differences were found between the three types of DSLD (all p values<0.01) where the children with language disorders only performed better. Older children performed better than the younger ones (plocomotor=0.029, pobject control<0.001), but the magnitude of differences between the children with DSLDs and their peers did not change with increasing age.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Children with DSLDs have poor gross motor skills. Although the performance of children with DSLDs improves with increasing age, it lags behind that of typically developing children. The present results emphasize the importance of early diagnosis and intervention for children with motor deficits.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Human Movement Sciences, University Medical Centre Groningen, University of Groningen, the Netherlands. c.visscher@med.umcg.nl
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Visscher
authors.forename: Suzanne
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Houwen
authors.forename: Ben
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Moolenaar
authors.forename: Jim
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lyons
authors.forename: Erik J A
authors.initials: EJ
authors.lastname: Scherder
authors.forename: Esther
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Hartman
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007805:Language Development Disorders / Q000150:complications*; D007807:Language Tests; D008124:Locomotion / Q000502:physiology; D008297:Male; D009048:Motor Skills / Q000502:physiology*; D009069:Movement Disorders / Q000150:complications*; D009460:Neurologic Examination; D012737:Sex Factors