ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the area of assessment of communication and the adult with a learning disability. It considers how to use the assessment material to plan intervention and set appropriate goals. Many people with learning disabilities respond to only one or two key words from any sentence, and even though they may understand the individual key components of a sentence, they may have difficulty in assimilating the whole. Many people with learning disabilities express themselves in one or two key-word phrases, either verbally or non-verbally, and this may be linked to their comprehension level or to the skills they have at their disposal. A large number of people with learning disabilities have some articulation difficulties. Assessment needs to show how much the person is able to understand, so that people can communicate at an appropriate level, and changes in the person’s form or tone of voice need to be noted so that staff are cued into their emotional state.
