Research has shown that many deaf students do not develop age-appropriate reading and writing abilities. This study evaluates the literacy skills of deaf students, hard of hearing students, and students with cochlear implants in bilingual/bicultural schools in Denmark. The results show that 45 per cent of the students did not have any reading and…

Purpose: To (a) familiarize readers with the components of emergent literacy and the impact hearing loss may have on the development of these skills; (b) demonstrate the importance of parent-professional collaboration and show how specific literacy-based activities can be integrated into existing daily routines and intervention programming; and…

This paper reviews the impact that cochlear implantation has had on the practice of deaf education in terms of educational placement, communication choices, and educational attainments. Although there is variation in outcome, more children with implants are going to mainstream schools, and using spoken language as their primary means of…

In the last two decades the population of deaf children has changed dramatically in these countries where universal hearing screening, early intervention, digital hearing aids, and cochlear implants are available. Most of these children can now acquire intelligible spoken language and they go to mainstream school in larger proportions. But…

This paper reports on a clinical trial evaluating outcomes of a frequency-lowering technique for adolescents and young adults with severe to profound hearing impairment. Outcomes were defined by changes in aided thresholds, speech perception, and acceptance. The participants comprised seven young people aged between 13 and 25 years. They were…

A common misconception about families in the UK who choose to participate in an Auditory Verbal (AV) approach for their child with hearing impairment, is that they are uniformly from affluent backgrounds. It is asserted that the good spoken language outcomes in these children are a product of the child's social background and family's values…

This paper reports the results of two studies of reading comprehension of Flemish children in Belgium. In the northern part of Belgium (Flanders), Dutch is the official language. The Dutch-speaking inhabitants of Flanders are called Flemish. Dutch is also the national language of the Netherlands. Despite both groups using Dutch, cultural…

The notion that young children form and test hypotheses about early print is well established in relation to children from different cultures who use different languages. This study demonstrates that this also obtains for young deaf children still in the early stages of developing spoken language. Data collected from the homes of 13 deaf children…

This paper assesses the expressive spoken grammar skills of young deaf children using cochlear implants who are beginning formal education, compares it with that achieved by normally hearing children and considers possible implications for educational management. Spoken language grammar was assessed, three years after implantation, in 45 children…

In the present study, language development of Dutch children with a cochlear implant (CI) in a bilingual educational setting and Flemish children with a CI in a dominantly monolingual educational setting is compared. In addition, we compared the development of spoken language with the development of sign language in Dutch children. Eighteen…

This study investigates the personal communication memories and experiences of adult deaf people during their childhoods in their homes. In order to obtain relevant information in depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with twenty four Cypriot deaf individuals between the ages of 19 to 54 years with different family and school…

This study examined the effects of using signs in spoken language vocabulary training of hard-of-hearing children. Fourteen hard-of-hearing children participated in the present study. Vocabulary training with the support of signs showed a statistically significant effect in the participants' learning and retention of new spoken language…

While cochlear implantation is an increasingly routine provision for profoundly deaf children in many countries, parents still require information about the procedure and likely outcomes in order to make an informed decision. Other parents can provide them with the insights of those who have undergone the process themselves and observed outcomes…

Providing unbiased data concerning the outcomes of particular intervention methods is imperative if professionals and parents are to assimilate information which could contribute to an "informed choice". An evaluation of Auditory Verbal Therapy (AVT) was conducted using a formal assessment of spoken language as an outcome measure. Spoken language…

This paper compares the views of parents and teachers of the deaf on deaf children's literacy at home. We made DVD recordings of 12 young deaf children (aged 3-5) sharing books with their parents at home. Six families used British Sign Language (BSL) as their main means of communication and for interacting around books, and six used spoken…