This case study describes the use of a syntax intervention with two deaf children who did not acquire a complete first language (L1) from birth. It looks specifically at their ability to produce subject-verb-object (SVO) sentence structure in American Sign Language (ASL) after receiving intervention. This was an exploratory case study in which…

The visual-manual modality of sign languages renders them a unique test case for language acquisition and processing theories. In this commentary the authors describe evidence from signed languages, and ask whether it is consistent with Ambridge's proposal. The evidence includes recent research on collocations in American Sign Language that reveal…

Previous studies suggest that age of acquisition affects the outcomes of learning, especially at the morphosyntactic level. Unknown is how syntactic development is affected by increased cognitive maturity and delayed language onset. The current paper studied the early syntactic development of adolescent first language learners by examining word…

Research interest in heritage speakers and their patterns of bilingual development has grown substantially over the last decade, prompting sign language researchers to consider how the concepts of heritage language and heritage speakers apply in the Deaf community. This overview builds on previous proposals that ASL [American Sign Language] and…

We examined the language and reading progress of 336 young DHH children in kindergarten, first and second grades. Trained assessors tested children's language, reading, and spoken and fingerspelled phonological awareness in the fall and spring of the school year. Children were divided into groups based on their auditory access and classroom…

Across a diverse range of languages, children proceed through similar stages in their production of causal language: their initial verbs lack internal causal structure, followed by a period during which they produce causative overgeneralizations, indicating knowledge of a productive causative rule. We asked in this study whether a child not…

Handshape works differently in nouns versus a class of verbs in American Sign Language (ASL) and thus can serve as a cue to distinguish between these two word classes. Handshapes representing characteristics of the object itself ("object" handshapes) and handshapes representing how the object is handled ("handling" handshapes)…

Sentence processing in American Sign Language (ASL) was investigated as a function of age of first language acquisition with a timed grammatical judgement task. Participants were 30 adults who were born deaf and first exposed to a fully perceptible language between the ages of birth and 13 years. Stimuli were grammatical and ungrammatical examples…

Obstacles confronting deaf students in language development are considered. American Sign Language is distinguished from English in terms of grammar, inflection and syntax, and context. The impact of deafness on language acquisition and cognitive development is examined. The importance of auditory feedback and verbal reinforcement is emphasized.…

Spontaneous gestures of a deaf child unexposed to sign language were studied to determine whether regularities existing within gestures were akin to morphological structure. The child's gestures, handshape/motion combinations forming a matrix for communication, suggest that structural regularity at the intraword level is a resilient property of…

The article surveys literature and research about deaf children's acquisition of American Sign Language, especially as it compares to language acquisition of their hearing peers. The development of manual articulation as well as vocabulary, morphology, syntax, and fingerspelling acquisition are discussed. (JL)

This paper stresses the concept of deaf students as visual learners. Educators are urged to think visually in order to help maximize opportunities for deaf students to use their visual learning skills in developing literacy skills, and in their general academic, social, and personal development. Examples are offered of structural/grammatical…

Studies the developmental stages deaf children pass through in acquiring the adult forms of pronominal classifiers in American Sign Language. Data were obtained on production, comprehension, and imitation from nine children aged 3 to 11. Complexities of classifier usage influence the learning strategies used. (PJM)

In an examination of the acquisition of the spatial syntax of American Sign Language (ASL), 43 children aged 3-10 years were given a range of comprehension and elicitation tests designed to analyze the subsystems involved in the corrrect use of ASL syntax. The subsystems were nominal establishment, verb agreement, and consistency of reference. The…

American Sign Language (ASL) is historically related to French Sign Language (FSL) of the early 19th century. A study underway at Gallaudet College is researching the historical development of both languages treating syntax, lexicon and formation. This paper deals with data in the form of still photos collected in France and published in a…