This paper offers training strategies designed to help profoundly hearing-impaired children learn to use information delivered via the Tactaid II+, a two-channel vibrotactile device. The paper describes function and monitoring of the aid, training activities, realistic and unrealistic goals, and a case study illustrating speech perception…

The speech intelligibility of 18 children with prelingual deafness was examined after using cochlear implants for an average of 3 years. The average speech intelligibility score of the nine children using oral communication was significantly higher than that of nine children using total communication. (DB)

This study found that children with early onset of deafness who received single-channel or multichannel cochlear implants before age 10 demonstrated higher speech intelligibility than children receiving their device after age 10. There was no obvious difference in speech intelligibility scores as a function of type of device (implant or tactile…