The present study investigated the conversational skills of a group of 18 children (aged 6 to 16 years) with severe and profound hearing loss. Participants included both hearing aid users and cochlear implant users. All the children relied upon spoken English and were included in regular classroom settings for at least part of each school day.…

Among parents of 48 children previously enrolled in oral/aural programs there was a significant correlation between overall perception of benefits of total communication (TC) and perception of children's educational and emotional growth. Most parents did not feel TC adversely affected speechreading, speech production, or hearing aid use. (CL)

Questionnaires completed by 195 teachers of deaf blind students revealed that additional handicapping conditions and the presence of undesirable behaviors had an important effect on the selection of communication methods. (CL)

George Veditz's "The Preservation of the Sign Language" was a popular film about the deaf language. Sixty five years later, in 1977, Veditz's film was retrieved and screened at the opening of a conference on the research and teaching of American Sign Language. Despite the age and the condition of the film, the screening held the audience…

Electroencephalogram and task performance data were collected from three groups of young adult males: profoundly deaf Ss who signed from an early age, profoundly deaf Ss who only used oral (speech and speedreading) methods of communication, and normal hearing Ss. Alpha and Beta brain wave patterns over the Wernicke's area were compared across…

The article presents data collected in a 1983 survey of educational practice in 50 oral preschool programs for hearing-impaired children in the United States and Canada. The focus is on materials used for organizing intervention in the areas of cognition, audition, language, and speech. An annotated bibliography of 18 curricula is included.…

Findings of a study involving two groups of teachers of the deaf (those who used oral language only and those who used total communication) revealed no differences in teachers' use of nonliteral language. Reduced use of idiomatic language occurred in both oral and sign communication, only when total communication was used. (CL)

The article reviews a study of interactions among deaf children, their parents and teachers which points out the need for developing early and ongoing contact with the deaf community. It is stressed that English and American Sign Language be given equal status in the classroom. (CL)

Spoken language of 24 teachers and 131 hearing impaired students (6, 10, and 14-year levels) were analyzed for sentence length and complexity. Results revealed that the oral-alone (OA) teachers in OA institutions created richer language environments and helped children display relatively enhanced oral linguistic growth compared to laissez faire…

Comparison of the relative effectiveness of oral and total communication training models for teaching expressive labeling skills to three echolalic autistic children (six-nine years old) demonstrated that total communication was the most successful approach with each of the Ss. (Author/CL)

An oral program for four-year-old children with hearing impairments features teamwork among direct interventionists (teacher, speech therapist, audiologist, psychologist, social workers, and parents) on rehabilitative speech therapy activities as well as integration of hearing with hearing impaired children. (CL)

It is argued that Oralism and Total Communication underestimate the profound nature of deafness and the potential value of fundamental research. The evolution of these philosophies is described, and changes in philosophy are discussed. (Author)

Three groups of teachers (10 regular teachers talking to 10 normally hearing students, 10 teachers of the deaf using oral communication to oral deaf children, and teachers of the deaf talking and signing with children taught through a manually coded English system) were videotaped in spontaneous conversation and a storytelling task. Children were…

The gap between oral and manual production of the 159 profoundly deaf children in total communication programs indicated that spoken English did not develop simultaneously with manually coded English and that Ss educated in programs using manually coded English did not develop competence with early developing English syntax faster than those not…

Fourteen deaf elementary children (eight from total communication and six from oral classes) and seven non-hearing-impaired peers were given tasks designed to elicit spontaneous language. Results favored hearing children on all measures. When comparing the two deaf groups, few differences emerged in measures of verbal output and communicativeness.…