Survey of auditory discrimination skill in 4-6 years old children in Semnan city

Auditory discrimination is one component of central auditory processing skills or auditory perception, that has an important role in acquisition and production of speech sounds. Auditory discrimination test is a tool for screening or diagnosis of auditory discrimination. r The aim of this study is to investigate of auditory discrimination development process in 4-6 years old children in Semnan city. This cross-sectional survey was done on 200 normal 4-6 years old children in semnan city. Auditory discrimination skill was evaluated by Wepman auditory discrimination test [WADT]. The level of significancy in this study was 0.05. Auditory discrimination skills based on percentage of 5 and 95 for 4 years old children were 20 and 36, 21.85 and 38 for 5 years old, 23.30 and 39.35 for 6 years old children. There was significant differences between 4 years old children with 5 and 6 years old children In auditory discrimination skill [P=0.003], but there was no significant difference between 5 and 6 years old children[P=0.21]. In addition, auditory discrimination test scores between boys and girls were not significant [P=0.34]. Results of this study showed that children ability in discrimination of sounds was increased with age

[Comparison of reading skills between cochlear implantation and normal hearing children in second and third grade elementary in Tehran]

Reading skill is necessary for academic achievement, that deaf children have problems in this skill due to hearing impairment. Use of cochlear implant can improve auditory inputs. The aim of this study was to investigate the reading skills of children with cochlear implants and comparing that with normal ones. This descriptive - analytic study was done on 24 children with cochlear implant and 24 normal ones that was selected from second and third grades students of Tehran primary schools. Children's reading performance was assessed by Nama reading test and the data were analyzed using T-test, linear regression and Pearson correlations. The results showed that the means of reading scores of normal children were significantly greater than the cochlear implanted ones [P<0.01]. Also, there was a significant relationship between reading skills and period of cochlear implant [P<0.01]. Cochlear implanted children showed weaker performance in reading skills than normal ones due to less access to auditory and Phonological information. It seems that early surgery and cochlear implant before the age of language learning can be partially compensated reading defects of deaf children

Translation of the test of childhood stuttering into Persian and investigation of validity and reliability of the test

The communicative functioning of children who stutter can be assessed in a variety of ways. Standardized tests are an important tool to assess communication skills particularly in stuttering children .The purpose of the present study was to translate the Test of childhood Stuttering [TOCS] into persian and investigation of validity and reliability of the test. In this research, 40 stutterers and 40 non-stutterer were evaluated. After the translation of the Test according to Protocol 1QOLA and its equalization to Persian Language, Content validity and Face validity of it were determined by the opinions of experts. Then, for concurrent validity determination 80 stutterer and non-stutterer children were examined by TOCS and SSI3 .In order to test reliability, test -retest and Cronbach's alpha were used. Entirely relevant items had simple translation. The translation items had content and face validity correlation between the marks of TOCS and SSI3 [p=0.000, r=%92]. TOCS has high Test-retest [p-0.000, ICC-%97] and internal reliability [p=0.000,a=%90]. Persian equalized TOCS [Test of childhood stuttering] have high validity and reliability, it might be useful to differentiate stuttering children among normal ones

Comparitive study of the role of morphological awareness in accuracy, speed and comprehension of reading in dyslexic and normal children in second grade of primary school

Dyslexia is a language learning disorder which leads to some impairment in written language including reading and spelling. Children with dyslexia are mostly suffering in areas like Morphology, Phonology, semantic and pragmatic. Thus the main purpose of this study is to investigate the morphological awareness, as a significant aspect in reading components [Speed, accuracy and understanding] in which the children are impaired. In the current study, 27 dyslexic students and 57 normal students in second grade of primary school participated. Existence of dyslexia was determined through administrating a reading test of [Nama], and in order to be sure that none of the students of normal group has language deficit, the language development test [TOLD] was administrated on normal students. In order to assess morphological knowledge of participants, a morphological awareness test was administrated too. In addition to determine the reading speed, accuracy and comprehension, the [NAMA] subtests were employed. Data obtained, were analyzed with the help of inferential statistical methods such as linear Pearson correlation coefficient test, Spearman test, Normal Kolmogrov - Smirnov test, T-test and linear regression test [ANOVA]. Correlation coefficient between morphological awareness and reading speed in whole sample was calculated to be -0.9158, that of morphological awareness and reading accuracy was 0.9514, and that of morphological awareness and reading comprehension was 0.926. This shows significant correlation among morphological awareness and components of reading skill. While the same correlation coefficients, in dyslexic children were respectively -0.689, 0.1403 and 0.1062. It shows that there was not significant relationship in dyslexic children. The T-test also indicated that morphological awareness, reading comprehension skills, reading speed and reading accuracy skills had significant meaningful differences between two groups. morphological awareness, reading speed, accuracy and comprehension, were in a lower level among dyslexic children in comparison with normal children, and this can be regarded as one linguistic aspect that can be effectual in reading speed, accuracy and comprehension. However among the dyslexic children whose difficulties were limited to the word level [e.g. dyslexic group sample], morphological awareness did not have any influence on their reading skills