THE PARENTS' ROLE IN COMMUNICATION AND LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

BY J. FREEMAN KING, ED.D.

NOW YOU'RE TALKING: The one thing that successful deaf students have in common is that they communicate frequently and easily with their families, and that the mode of communication is less important than the quality of communication.

Possessing language proficiency and meaningful communication skills is a major necessity for human life—how to deeply and effectively share meanings with others in the immediate environment. It has long been debated whether or not access to, and use of a visual language, enhances or hampers the efforts of deaf children who are learning to develop literacy skills in English.

Research indicates that the most critical language learning occurs in a very short window of time, 0-5 years of age— and lack of consistent exposure to, and use of language in this critical period, can have dire and permanent effects. In fact, babies begin to communicate intentionally before the end of their first year, and, thereafter language develops at an exponential rate. Most children's language development proceeds at an amazing pace. Numerous studies have shown that by the time a child enters kindergarten, he/she has a vocabulary of about 8,000 words and almost all of the basic grammatical forms of their language are in place. Early vocabulary skills have been shown to indicate a strong relationship to later reading skills.

However, only possessing vocabulary skills is not sufficient to total language development. By kindergarten, children who can hear, are able to comfortably interact with questions, negative statements, dependent clauses, compound sentences, and a great variety of other linguistic constructions. Because of the ability to hear, the hearing child naturally, and almost magically, begins to acquire language. However, for the child who is deaf, failure to provide meaningful, deep, and complete language access at an early age can have detrimental effects, not only on language development, but also in other aligned areas. Research indicates that language competency can powerfully affect children's development of fundamental social and cognitive skills. Children without deep and meaningful language skills not only have problems with academics, but also with self-esteem and behavior issues.

An often-used measure of a child's cognitive development is the concept that allows one to distinguish his/her own thoughts, beliefs, desires, and emotions from those of others, and is firmly cemented in early and natural language acquisition. Most hearing children reach this milestone around the age of four. Sadly, this cannot be said of many deaf children.

Without having grasped this ability to identify one's own thoughts, beliefs, desires, and emotions from those of others, education is all but impossible. Education requires children to talk about mutual understandings and misunderstandings, to reflect on their own beliefs, as well as others, and to shift perspectives where evidence suggests that another point of view is valid. Additionally, these children have educational problems, and are also more likely to have problems with behavior and selfesteem.

Consistent inability to understand and to interact with others and the environment may negatively affect the child's estimation of himself and make him/her feel helpless to request and obtain the information and things he/she desires. Such is often the state of the child who is deaf.

Delayed language acquisition also fosters consequences that extend far beyond the classroom. Inappropriate behavior is an area in which low language ability is considered a risk factor. It is evident that educators and parents need to focus on using a communication form that can replace the problem behavior. 

Considering the risks associated with low-language ability, it is not surprising that deaf children are frequently at risk to exhibit behavior problems. Lack of communicative abilities can cause temper tantrums as children struggle to make their needs known. As long as a child is not able to communicate meaningfully, the child and his/her parents experience frustration that might otherwise be prevented. However, there is hope: it has been found that deaf children who are the most competent in their social, cognitive, and linguistic devel opment are those who have participated in active linguistic interaction with their parents from an early age.

The one thing that successful deaf students have in common is that they communicate frequently and easily with their families, and that the mode of communication is less important than the quality of communication. Deep and meaningful early communication between a child and the people in his/her environment provides positive effects, not only in language development, but also in cognitive, psychological, and social development. The answer to the biggest difficulty faced by deaf students is an approach that will facilitate the highest quality of communication for each child from the very earliest age possible.

The question naturally arises as to what this approach might encompass. Research has shown that the use of a visual language, such as American Sign Language (ASL) with deaf children will produce positive communication results long before the child is physically capable of reproducing the sounds and patterns of speech, and to promote early communication with their hands and facial expressions much sooner than they can master verbal skills. The use of signs can encourage communication at least six months before most hearing children start to form basic words, and resultantly increases the parents' bond and interaction with the deaf baby, as well as reducing a major source of frustration and stress for the infant.

Initially, hearing parents might not feel comfortable with sign language and tend to sign only when they communicate directly with their deaf child. This presents a difficulty for the deaf child in that it does not allow them to access environmental and incidental learning. Therefore, it is vital that hearing parents sign everything, even though their signing may first be simple and incomplete. This provides the opportunity for the child to start developing language. It is vitally important to COMMUNICATE, to SHARE MEANINGS, and not to worry about perceived language inadequacies of the language model (the parent). Communication is the key that leads to full, complete language development.•

WHAT RESEARCH AND COMMON SENSE TELL THE PARENTS

Many professionals, parents, and society, in general, have adhered to an erroneous belief that exposing and teaching a deaf child two languages, (American Sign Language and spoken English), simultaneously may cause language delay or language confusion. This belief has been conclusively shown to be untrue. In fact, the easier identification of signed versus spoken vocabulary made it possible for researchers to prove that deaf children learning signed and spoken languages simultaneously reach all of the major language milestones, such as first-word, first 50 words, and first two-word phrases, on a similar timetable in each of their two languages, and on a timetable similar to that at which hearing babies reach all of the same milestones.

Research has also proven that introducing young deaf children to sign language does not prevent or impair their ability or motivation to later acquire spoken language. There has been no empirical research that demonstrates that learning sign language as a first language impedes the learning of spoken language. In fact, deaf children who learn sign language as a first language generally have been shown to have better reading and writing skills than deaf children exposed only to spoken language. Also, using sign language does not interfere with reading comprehension skills, or with students' abilities to read and write. Expressive language ability, when both spoken and signed output are considered, is a significant predictor of speech outcomes.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: J. Freeman King, Ed.D. is Professor of Deaf Education, Utah State University in Logan, Utah.