Deaf and hearing children's plural noun spelling

Abstract

The present study examines deaf and hearing children's spelling of plural nouns. Severe literacy impairments are well documented in the deaf, which are believed to be a consequence of phonological awareness limitations. Fifty deaf (mean chronological age 13;10 years, mean reading age 7;5 years) and 50 reading-age-matched hearing children produced spellings of regular, semiregular, and irregular plural nouns in Experiment 1 and nonword plurals in Experiment 2. Deaf children performed reading-age appropriately on rule-based (regular and semiregular) plurals but were significantly less accurate at spelling irregular plurals. Spelling of plural nonwords and spelling error analyses revealed clear evidence for use of morphology. Deaf children used morphological generalization to a greater degree than their reading-age-matched hearing counterparts. Also, hearing children combined use of phonology and morphology to guide spelling, whereas deaf children appeared to use morphology without phonological mediation. Therefore, use of morphology in spelling can be independent of phonology and is available to the deaf despite limited experience with spoken language. Indeed, deaf children appear to be learning about morphology from the orthography. Education on more complex morphological generalization and exceptions may be highly beneficial not only for the deaf but also for other populations with phonological awareness limitations.

Research Methods in Studying Reading and Literacy Development in Deaf Children Who Sign

“…However, it is possible to assess deaf children's knowledge of particular aspects of spelling such as plurals through specially designed experimental tasks. For example, Breadmore, Olson and Krott (2012) designed a picture based test of children's plural noun spelling in which children were shown a picture of a singular noun "person" along with the printed word "person" and then a picture of "people" and asked to write the corresponding plural noun.…”

Agreeing to Disagree: Deaf and Hearing Children's Awareness of Subject–Verb Number Agreement

“…Results from our explicit task are particularly compelling given our own previous findings indicating that a very similar population of deaf children demonstrate good understanding of regular plural noun morphology (Breadmore, 2008;Breadmore et al, 2012).…”

“…They have been shown to outperform their reading-age matched counterparts when spelling regular noun plurals (Breadmore, Olson & Krott, 2012).…”

Correspondances morphologiques entre le français et la langue des signes française :

“…Trussell & Easterbrooks (2016) ont analysé treize études portant sur les aspects morphologiques ou morphographiques avec des participants sourds et malentendants (de 3 à 21 ans). Les études ont été retenues selon les critères suivants : l'âge (4 études seulement concernent des enfants de moins de 11 ans), le sexe, l'origine ethnique, le cadre, la communication (seulement 3 études mentionnent le bilinguisme LS/langue écrite dont les deux études de Breadmore et al (2012) sur la morphologie flexionnelle. À notre connaissance, l'équipe de Daigle & Dubuisson au Québec est la seule à avoir travaillé sur les questions de morphologie en s'intéressant à la situation linguistique des enfants sourds (adolescents) et soutenant la thèse qui prône l'exposition langagière en LS comme principe fondateur des compétences en lecture.…”