Language Sample For Dummies — In 20 Minutes of Less!

Language Sample for Dummies: Get It Done in 20 Minutes or Less TK–8th Grade · SLP Resource · Bilingual-Responsive · Editable Word Document

Language samples are one of the most powerful tools in your assessment toolkit — and one of the most avoided. The barrier is never the clinical value. It's always the time.

This resource gives you everything you need to collect, transcribe, analyze, and turn a language sample into defensible goals in one sitting. No software required. No specialized materials. Just what's already in your speech room and this guide.

What's inside:

A 20-minute protocol at a glance so you always know exactly what to do and when. Age-banded stimulus prompts for TK through 8th grade covering play-based, narrative, conversational, and expository elicitation. A complete morpheme counting guide, C-unit and T-unit definitions with worked examples, and a step-by-step MLU calculation walkthrough.

A 50-utterance recording chart with two color-coded example rows showing exactly how to calculate C-units, T-units, and morpheme counts, so you can see the analysis in action before you start. A totals row and quick calculations box for MLU, MLU-C, and maze ratio are built right into the chart.

A transcription conventions cheat sheet adapted from SALT standards with 12 symbols, utterance boundary rules, and a worked transcription excerpt so every clinician on your team transcribes consistently.

A findings-to-goals bridge that connects your sample results directly to therapy targets. If MLU is low, if morphemes are missing, if narrative structure is behind this section will tell you exactly which domain to target and which section of the Power of Play SMART Goal Bank to go to for the ready-to-use goal.

A bilingual parent recording guide in both English and Spanish — a print-and-give handout that walks caregivers through how to record a home language sample on their phone and send it to you. No interpreter needed to use it.

Full bilingual and EL considerations throughout, including conceptual scoring guidance, a Spanish-influenced English features table, and a 5-minute home language add-on protocol.

Documentation phrases ready to paste into Welligent or your evaluation report. An interpretation guide. Key measures reference tables including Brown's Stages and school-age norms. And a full reference list with 11 APA-formatted citations.

The whole thing is fully editable, hyperlinked, and built for clinicians who are doing real work with real caseloads on Monday morning.

Designed by a bilingual SLP for speech therapy. Built for the clinicians who needed this yesterday.