Background: The discovery of clinical markers for specific language impairment (SLI) in children can assist in the accurate identification of children with this disorder, and in a description of the disorder's phenotype for genetic study. One challenge to this type of research is the fact that languages vary in the most salient symptoms of SLI. This study focuses on Italian. Aims: To determine whether three measures — the use of third‐person plural inflections, the use of direct‐object clitics and non‐word repetition — are successful in distinguishing Italian‐speaking children with SLI from their typically developing peers. Methods & Procedures: Eleven preschool‐aged children with SLI, 11 same‐age typically developing peers and 11 younger typically developing children participated in the study. The third‐person plural inflection and direct‐object clitic tasks required the children to describe drawings in response to prompts provided by the examiner. In the non‐word repetition task, the children repeated non‐words ranging from one to four syllables in length. Outcomes & Results: All three measures proved successful either singly or in combination, with direct‐object clitics and non‐word repetition showing the highest sensitivity and specificity. Conclusions: Additional research should be pursued to replicate and extend these findings. Along with the potential clinical value of the findings, the results suggest that difficulties with non‐final weak syllables — a problem that would adversely affect all three measures — may be an important part of the SLI profile in Italian.

An intervention aimed at improving academic writing—in particular, synthesis writing—was conducted with 52 undergraduate students of psychology of the University of Padua (Italy). Before and after the intervention, which lasted 12 weeks, participants were administered a questionnaire on beliefs about writing and a synthesis writing task. During the intervention, participants practised academic writing by composing texts which were revised by the teacher, and analysing and discussing examples of good and poor academic texts. The results showed an improvement in students' ability to write a synthesis, whereas their beliefs about writing were only partially affected by the intervention.

Several programs have been developed worldwide to improve children’s executive functions (EFs). Yet, the role played in EF development by learning activities embedded in the school curriculum has received scarce attention. With two studies, we recently tested the effects of computational thinking (CT) and coding—a new element of the primary school curriculum—on the development of children’s EFs. CT stimulates the ability to define a clear and orderly sequence of simple and well-specified steps to solve a complex problem. We conjecture that CT skills are associated to such EF processes as response inhibition and planning. In a first between-group cluster-randomized controlled trial, we tested the effects of 1-month coding activities on 76 first graders’ planning and response inhibition against those of 1-month standard STEM activities of a control group. In a second study, we tested the effects of 1-month coding activities of 17 second graders in two ways: within group (longitudinally), against 7 months of standard activities experienced by the same children (experimental group); and between groups, in comparison to the effects of standard STEM activities in a control group of 19 second graders. The results of the two studies show significant benefits of learning to code: children exposed to coding improved significantly more in planning and inhibition tasks than control children did. The longitudinal data showed that improvements in planning and inhibition skills after 1 month of coding activities (eight lessons) were equivalent to or greater than the improvement attained after 7 months of standard activities. These findings support the hypothesis that learning CT via coding can significantly boost children’s spontaneous development of EFs.