The reading and language development of severely and profoundly deaf children in a total communication environment

Abstract

The purpose of this two year cross-sectional and longitudinal study was to examine the reading and language of severely and profoundly deaf children over two years. The focus was on reading and language achievement, measured by standardized tests and the process of reading demonstrated when engaged in reading prose. The children were the entire population of severely and profoundly deaf, aged from 5 to 10 years at the commencement of the study, who had no other educational handicaps. They were being educated within a Total Communication programme at the Kelston School for Deaf and associated unit classrooms. Reading achievement was assessed by the Gates-MacGinitie Reading Assessment Test on three occasions, each one year apart. Reading achievement was also assessed by documenting accuracy and comprehension (retelling) when reading natural language texts. Language achievement was measured using the Grammatical Analysis of Elicited Language (Moog and Geers, 1979, 1980). The relationship between reading and language achievement was established. The reading of natural language stories was analyzed to establish the pattern of errors (miscues) on text at two levels of difficulty for the reader. Categories of semantically appropriate, syntactically appropriate, grammatically similar, the omission of inflectional morphemes, fingerspelt miscues and signing errors were established. Comparisons were made between age groups, proficiency groups(High and Low) and across developmental levels. Cloze passages were also analysed to assess the use of contextual information by these readers. Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) were undertaken for each miscue category in the signed reading, classified by age and proficiency of the reader, and difficulty of the text. Analyses of variance (ANOVA) were undertaken for the miscue categories classified by reading level, and the cloze exercise substitution classified by age and proficiency of the reader. Observations of classroom reading instructions were included to document the environment within which the children were being educated. Six individual case studies, three high progress and three low progress, were also analyzed. The findings suggest that reading achievement of these severely and profoundly deaf readers is still low. This is consistent with previous studies but achievement in comparison with earlier New Zealand data and data from surveys in the U.S. was slightly higher. This study supported previous research that suggested that standardized tests of reading do not adequately measure the reading achievement of deaf readers. High positive correlations (r ≥.90) between reading and language achievement were interpreted to be bi-directional and suggestive that higher rates of engaged time in reading could facilitate greater reading and language development. An integrated/interactive model most appropriately described the process of reading for these deaf readers as for hearing readers. Like hearing readers these deaf readers, at all ages and both high and low progress, were able to utilize contextual cues, and textual cues as they interacted with text. However, several unique differences in the process of reading have important implications for instruction. Low levels of syntactic cues during signed reading, it was suggested, reflect the readers use of their language in use and sensitivity to task factors. Fingerspelling was demonstrated to be a potentially useful strategy that was used at a significantly higher rate by High Progress readers. High Progress readers were more able than Low progress readers to use strategies ensuring fluency in order to construct meaning from texts Observations of classroom reading indicated that the rate of engaged time in reading was not high and that although the teachers espoused a meaning-emphasis some practices in the classroom did not foster independent problem solving readers. The educational implications of the data were discussed.