Browsing by Author "Määttä, Lilli"

The purpose of this systematized review is to examine reading comprehension of deaf children. It is a well-known fact that the main aim of literacy is to comprehend text. In Finland, the term reading comprehension contains text reading as well as multiliteracy. There is evidence that language and speech development are related to hearing (e.g. Lederberg, A. R., Schick, B. & Spencer, P. E. 2013). Similar results have been found with literacy skills (e.g. Mayer, C. 2007, 411). With this initial information I hypothesize that deaf children will perform with poor success when compared to their hearing peers. I also expect that Cochlear implanted children will do better than children without implants. The data of reading comprehension and related factors was collected between 2000 and 2019. Selection criteria included following terms: profound or severe hearing loss with or without hearing aids, diagnosed congenitally or early childhood, deafness is primary disability, IQ was at least at normal level and learning difficulties have not been found. For instance, keywords included deaf and reading comprehension. In total, 16 studies were included. The present review showed that deaf children seems to be poorer in comprehending text. Despite that, there was still variation between different studies of level of reading comprehension of deaf children. Cochlear implanted children were better than children without implants, as hypothesized. It was also shown that morphological, semantical and syntactical awareness are related to reading comprehension of deaf children. Vocabulary and word identification were separately related to reading comprehension. Due to complexity and limited data of the subject, it should be considered that the subject should be examined further. In addition, it is essential to find out how to support the development of reading comprehension. Therefore, it would also be important to examine how different communication methods and teaching programs are related to deaf children’s reading comprehension.