Book excerpt: The book summarises research findings from a range of projects using a set of auditory and speech procedures designed for the psycholinguistic framework developed by Stackhouse and Wells (1997). These procedures have been used with children and adolescents with a range of difficulties associated with cleft lip and palate, dysarthria, dyspraxia, phonological impairment, Down syndrome, dyslexia, stammering, autism, semantic-pragmatic difficulties, general learning difficulties, and disadvantaged backgrounds. The procedures have also been used with normally developing children in the age range of 3-7 years. As a result, the book includes descriptions of typical performance on the procedures so that atypical can be identified more easily. In addition, as the materials were used in a longitudinal study of children’s speech and literacy development between the age of 4 and 7 years we can highlight which procedures will help in identifying children a) who are likely to persist with their speech difficulties and b) have associated literacy difficulties.