Total communication procedures were used with three severely mentally retarded children (mental ages 2 to 4) to examine the effects of receptive speech on the acquisition and maintenance of manual signing. Signs corresponding to known words were generally acquired faster and retained better than signs corresponding to unknown words. (Author/JW)

Analysis of stop consonant production by 12 children (ages 6-12) who have used cochlear implants for at least 5 years indicates children's stop inventories differed from English mainly in having additional, non-English stops. Total communication users had fewer ambient stops and more nonambient ones that did oral communication users. (Contains…