Early visual language skills affect the trajectory of literacy gains over a three-year period of time for preschool aged deaf children who experience signing in the home.

ABSTRACT: Previous research has established a correlation between literacy skills and sign language skills among deaf children raised in signing families, but little research has examined the impact of early signing skills on the rate of growth of emergent literacy in early childhood. A subset of data was extracted from a larger dataset containing national longitudinal data from a three-year investigation of early literacy development of deaf children who were between the ages of three and six at the outset of the study. Selection criteria for inclusion in this limited sample included: 1) being rated as having little or no access to spoken language and 2) being raised in homes in which signs were regularly used as a means of communication (N = 56). Our purpose was twofold: 1) to examine and describe

SUBMITTER: Allen TE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7046216 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature