r all families, it is particularly difficult for parents who have children with special needs as they struggle to cope with the developmental difficulties of their children. In order to provide a specific examination of this issue, this paper will focus on the topic of children with Down's syndrome and their parents. Caused primarily by a third Chromosome 21 that leads to mental retardation, Down's syndrome is not only associated with unique physical features, but also problems with verbal and language skills (Fidler, Hodapp, & Dykens, 2002, p. 80).
According to Fidler, Hodapp and Dykens (2002), the majority of children with Down's syndrome are unable to improve their grammatical skills significantly after the three-year mark. In fact, their acquisition of grammatical knowledge usually lags behind their mental age levels. Moreover, children with Down's syndrome experience considerably more difficulties in their expressive language than in their receptive language. Most of these children also have articulation problems, maki
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