Dewart and Summers (1994) believe that parents are unfamiliar about stages of normal language development, and
therefore are not confident in their reports. However, if questioned appropriately they are able to record information with
minimum distortion, as illustrated in Table 4. Parents should therefore always be involved in assessment, as they are
uniquely able to provide complementary information to professionals’ assessment.
The results obtained with this protocol can be used for the planning and following up of intervention programmes for deaf
children, as well as for assessment purposes, and may also be useful for hearing children with communication disorders or
developmental delays as well as for deaf children. During this study it was found that training for SLTs and interpreters took
about 2 h, and administration of the protocol about 60 min per child: much less time than the three or four sessions required
for previous assessments. This protocol has been used in the Language and Deafness Service of University of Sa˜o Paulo with