Using rhythm to teach spelling to a child with autism

textThe purpose of this study was to develop a multimodal spelling acquisition program (MSAP) for children with autism that capitalizes on sensory perception skills that may be intact with this population to teach early spelling skills. Progress was monitored through seven phases: pre-assessment, baseline probe, acquisition probe, instruction sessions, post-assessment, and maintenance probes of the treatment. MSAP provides for three spelling instructional conditions: (1) instruction with rhythmic auditory feedback in the form of Morse Code presented via speakers at 450 Hz, (2) instruction with rhythmic tactile feedback of Morse Code presented via a bone oscillator, and (3) instruction without feedback. The MSAP program recorded the child's performance for spelling accuracy and rate for each word during the assessment probes. Although the child acquired spelling knowledge of the target words, the statistical analysis revealed no significant difference in the spelling acquisition between the instruction conditions. The computerized instruction did generalize to untaught words. This study's limitations and future directions are discussed.Communication Sciences and Disorder

Using Multisensory Input to Supplement Articulation Intervention

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of multisensory input on the discrimination and production abilities of a preschool aged child with a speech sound disorder. The study examined the effect of Van Riper\u27s traditional articulation intervention approach supplemented with multisensory cues taken from the Sound Strategies for Sound Production resource (Treatment B), in contrast to Van Riper\u27s traditional articulation intervention approach alone (Treatment A). One male child, aged 4 years, 4 months, diagnosed with a mild-moderate speech sound disorder, participated in this single subject, alternating treatment study. Treatment was provided for 30 minutes, 3 days a week, for 6 weeks in a quiet room at the Eastern Illinois University (EIU) Speech-Language-Hearing Clinic (Clinic). Two speech sounds (/l/ and /ʃ/) and one consonant cluster (/sp/) were individually targeted during both treatments. Each target was addressed for 6 sessions before moving on to the next target, and treatment types were counterbalanced during each set of 6 sessions. The Goldman-Fristoe Test of Articulation 2 (GFTA-2) was administered pre- and post-treatment to determine change in the participant\u27s speech. Both treatments proved to be effective in correcting the child\u27s speech sound errors. Although slight gains were evident during certain phases of treatment, no overall significant differences were found between the two treatment types. Despite this lack of significance, the post-treatment GFTA-2 results, and additional subjective data, suggested positive outcomes for the supplementation of multisensory input into a traditional articulation treatment approach

A Satellite Association Procedure

A procedure is derived for estimating the consistency of a radar observation of an object with a prediction of an orbiting object. This procedure may be of use as an association procedure., i.e., to insure that data is indeed being taken on an intended object before associating the new data with old data on the object. Specifically we show that, with reasonable assumptions about the observational and prediction errors, a quadratic form associated with the position error vector has a chi-square distribution with 3 degrees of freedom. Thus we can compute the probability of the residual if the observation and the prediction come from the same object. A low probability is taken as an indication that the prediction and observation refer to different objects. The computational procedure is described in detail, and a Monte Carlo run is included to demonstrate the correctness of the procedure

Making tools and making sense: complex, intentional behaviour in human evolution

Stone tool-making is an ancient and prototypically human skill characterized by multiple levels of intentional organization. In a formal sense, it displays surprising similarities to the multi-level organization of human language. Recent functional brain imaging studies of stone tool-making similarly demonstrate overlap with neural circuits involved in language processing. These observations consistent with the hypothesis that language and tool-making share key requirements for the construction of hierarchically structured action sequences and evolved together in a mutually reinforcing way

Cognitive Information Processing

Contains research objectives and reports on two research projects.Joint Services Electronics Program by the U. S. Army Research Office, Durham, under Contract DA 36-039-AMC-03200(E)National Science Foundation (Grant GP-2495)National Institutes of Health (Grant MH-04737-05)National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Grant NsG-496

Summer Institute in Biomedical Engineering, 1973

Bioengineering of medical equipment is detailed. Equipment described includes: an environmental control system for a surgical suite; surface potential mapping for an electrode system; the use of speech-modulated-white-noise to differentiate hearers and feelers among the profoundly deaf; the design of an automatic weight scale for an isolette; and an internal tibial torsion correction study. Graphs and charts are included with design specifications of this equipment

Implementing Multisensory Techniques when Teaching Letter Knowledge

Small-group interventions involving multisensory techniques when teaching letter knowledge to Kindergarten students in the English language have not been researched. It is important to research the use of multisensory techniques in small-group instructional efforts when teaching letter knowledge because letter knowledge contributes to students’ gaining reading abilities; and, reading abilities, in turn, contribute to students’ academic success (Gellert & Elbro, 2017; Huang & Konold, 2014; Musti-Rao & Cartledge, 2007). The purpose of this quantitative quasi-experimental study was to determine whether small group instruction involving multisensory techniques had an impact on Kindergarten students’ letter knowledge. The study divided 30 Kindergarten students into two groups: a treatment group, who received the small-group intervention using multimodal methods when teaching letter names, and a control group who received standard of care. Data were analyzed by conducting both independent and paired samples t-tests. The results indicated that the treatment group made a small gain in their mean score (i.e., an increase in the treatment group’s mean score from 30.07 to 31.47), showing that the intervention had a positive impact; however, this impact was not statistically significant. Based on the results, teachers can see the potential impact that the small-group instruction involving multisensory techniques can have on their students’ letter knowledge. Therefore, the small-group instruction can supplement the regular literacy instruction. Additionally, the intervention could lead to research into interventions using multisensory techniques for the other early reading skills (i.e., phonological awareness and phonemic awareness)

The Effects of Music Instruction on Phonological Awareness in Children with Hearing Impairment

Phonological awareness skills are essential for reading development. Children with hearing loss lack access to essential auditory information that allows development of phonological awareness (Dillon, John, & Pisoni, 2011). Music instruction is becoming a popular approach to teach reading for typically developing children, and studies have supported beneficial effects from this treatment methodology. However, there is limited research regarding the use of music to teach phonological awareness and reading skills to children with hearing impairment (Gromko, 2005). The effectiveness of a music program on increasing phonological awareness skills in children who are deaf or hard-of-hearing was evaluated in this study. The dependent variable was performance on the Phonological Awareness Test-2 (PAT-2) (Robertson & Salter, 2007). The independent variable was the introduction of a music program that focused on temporal, tonal, and melodic elements. Music sessions were conducted by the primary researcher, classroom teacher and a certified music teacher. Four children between five and nine years of age who were enrolled in an educational program for children who are deaf or hard-of-hearing within a public school were participants in the study. One participant wore bilateral hearing aids and three wore cochlear implants. Music was introduced four times a week for 15 minutes twice a day, and pre and post-test measures were completed using the PAT-2. Changes in raw scores greater than 50% were rated as notable, and results indicated improvements for Participant 4 in the treatment group in the areas of Deletion, Blending, and Decoding. The largest improvement occurred in the Decoding subtest. Participant 3 in the treatment group displayed improvements in the areas of Isolation and Decoding, with the greatest increase in Isolation. Participants in the control group maintained consistent or lower performance on all subtest and total test standard scores

Altered Auditory Feedback Causing Changes in the Vowel Production of Children with Specific Language Impairment

Specific language impairment (SLI), an unexpected delay in the onset or development of oral language, has been hypothesized to have an underlying auditory processing component. Auditory feedback is a mechanism by which an individual controls the characteristics of their own voice, thereby assisting in the processing and production of speech. These characteristics include intensity, frequency, speed and others. The present study examined whether children with SLI make different use of auditory feedback than their typically developing (TD) peers. Participants aged 6-11 years completed a hearing screening, a frequency resolution task, vowel space task and a formant shifted auditory feedback task. Children with SLI tended to compensate more for the manipulation in the positive shift condition, and compensated similarly to TD children in the smaller, negative shift condition. These findings may indicate that children with SLI are making atypical use of auditory feedback