Emergent Literacy Skills in Preschool Children With Hearing Loss Who Use Spoken Language: Initial Findings From the Early Language and Literacy Acquisition (ELLA) Study
Publication: Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools
Volume 48, Number 4
Pages 249-259
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study was to compare change in emergent literacy skills of preschool children with and without hearing loss over a 6-month period.
Method
Participants included 19 children with hearing loss and 14 children with normal hearing. Children with hearing loss used amplification and spoken language. Participants completed measures of oral language, phonological processing, and print knowledge twice at a 6-month interval. A series of repeated-measures analyses of variance were used to compare change across groups.
Results
Main effects of time were observed for all variables except phonological recoding. Main effects of group were observed for vocabulary, morphosyntax, phonological memory, and concepts of print. Interaction effects were observed for phonological awareness and concepts of print.
Conclusions
Children with hearing loss performed more poorly than children with normal hearing on measures of oral language, phonological memory, and conceptual print knowledge. Two interaction effects were present. For phonological awareness and concepts of print, children with hearing loss demonstrated less positive change than children with normal hearing. Although children with hearing loss generally demonstrated a positive growth in emergent literacy skills, their initial performance was lower than that of children with normal hearing, and rates of change were not sufficient to catch up to the peers over time.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools
Volume 48 • Number 4 • October 2017
Pages: 249-259
PubMed: 28973172
Copyright
Copyright © 2017 American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.
History
- Received: Feb 17, 2017
- Revised: Mar 29, 2017
- Accepted: Jul 19, 2017
- Published in issue: Oct 5, 2017
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