The field of education of the deaf is a relatively new one, particularly in Canada. Little information on the Canadian schools for the deaf has been compiled or published. This paper was written, therefore, to survey the facilities that are being provided by the provinces of Canada for the education of deaf children. It covers all the schools for the deaf, residential and day, and deals briefly with several day classes that some of the public school boards in the larger Canadian cities have started. A brief survey of the historical background of early deaf education in Europe and the United States and of the meaning of the various methods of instruction and communication has been included to show their influence on the Canadian schools and to help explain why certain methods are used in these schools. This is followed by an historical account of the various Schools for the Deaf in Canada. A section on "Instruction" sets forth the principles and practices in respect to academic, vocational, social, and religious instruction at present given in each school. Problems, regarding teacher training facilities, pre-school and clinics, parent education programs, and some common misconceptions about the deaf and their education, are dealt with in separate chapters. The final section summarizes present trends and looks forward to possible future development. Initial work involved consideration of British and American relevant literature. Information relating directly to the schools themselves was obtained chiefly by questionaires sent to the school superintendents and to the superintendents of the public school boards involved. This information was supplemented by data from the Provincial Education Reports and the American Annals of the Deaf. Interviews and correspondence with a large number of people who had worked or were still working in the field were invaluable in filling out the picture. It is hoped that the data accumulated will be of benefit: first, to the staffs and schools for the deaf in Canada; secondly, to educational institutions and related fields; thirdly, to parents of deaf children and all others concerned. / Education, Faculty of / Graduate

Prelingual, profoundly deaf children (90 db. loss unaided in the better ear over the speech range) lack one major sensory channel essential for normal learning, therefore they must rely almost exclusively on vision for learning. They must learn to make meaningful visual associations in order to understand the world around them. These associations have particular relevance for language acquisition and communication. A child with normal hearing makes visual associations too, (e.g. white with milk), however, this child has the additional auditory and vocal information input to assist the learning process. Unlike his deaf counterpart, he often hears the word "milk" without seeing the object which the word represents. Furthermore, if a picture of an object is presented to a child, he can say the word it represents. As a child matures and develops, he learns to read and write these words and has therefore some degree of linguistic competence. Here language will mean the spoken and written language of a culture. Language affects mediation, which is defined as a response or series of responses which intervene between the external stimulus and the overt response to provide stimulation that influences the eventual course of behaviour, (Kendler and Kendler, 1959). The mediation habits of hearing and deaf children provided a theoretical framework for this study. Color-Picture (C-P) and Color-Word (C-W) experiential and task paired associates were compared utilizing three conditions: (natural) matched, neutral, and reversed for two age levels of deaf and hearing children, CA 7 and CA 11. The number of errors in associations was the response measure and the data were analyzed by a 2x2x2x3 analysis of variance with replication. The specific hypotheses tested were: (1) The deaf Ss would have significantly lower mean error scores on the reversal condition than their hearing peers. (2) The CA 7 year old group would have significantly higher mean error scores than the CA 11 year group. (3) The Color-Word task would produce significantly higher mean error scores than the Color-Picture task. (4) The reversal condition would have significantly more mean errors than the neutral or matched condition. Justification for these hypotheses are: (1) The study by Furth and Youniss (1964) found the deaf Ss made fewer errors on the reversal condition. This was interpreted to be a result of less verbally mediated interference by the deaf. (2) Developmental studies indicate better performance by older groups. (Furth 1964, Reese 1959, Kendler and Kendler 1961). (3) Furth and Youniss (1964) found an interference condition (reversal) more difficult than a non-interference condition (neutral, matched). (4) A-priori, Color-Word association requires more abstraction than Color-Picture and is therefore more difficult. The results of the analysis of variance indicated: (1) No significant difference was found •between hearing Ss and deaf Ss. (2) A significant difference (p<. 01) between CA 7 and CA 11, the older group making fewer errors. (3) The reversal condition was significantly the most difficult of the three conditions (p<.01). (4) A significant difference (p<. 01) between tasks, the C-W task accounting for more errors. Significant Two Way Interactions (p<.01) were noted: Age x Hearing Status and Age x Task. A Three Way Interaction - Age x Task x Conditions was also significant (p<.05). The absence of a significant difference in performance by hearing and deaf Ss was contrary to one of the major hypotheses of the study. This seems to indicate that the mediation habits of the two hearing status groups, whatever their nature, do not significantly differentiate the groups in performance on association type tasks. The significant differences found between Age, Task and Conditions as main effects are not independent but must be qualified by the statistically significant interaction among these three variables. / Education, Faculty of / Graduate

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The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of rehearsal in the short-term memory of visually-presented linguistic material in deaf students. An experimental approach was employed to determine if instruction in overt dactylic and articulatory rehearsal would make a difference in the short-term recall of verbal material. In addition, the study investigated the role of age in the development of short-term memory in deaf children.The subjects in the study were 87 prelingually deaf students at a state residential school for the deaf. The subjects were between the ages of 6-2 and 13-8 and were of at least low average non-verbal intelligence. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of three treatment conditions: (a) instruction in overt dactylic rehearsal, (b) instruction in overt articulatory rehearsal, or (c) no instruction in rehearsal.All subjects received treatment in groups of four to six for one session which lasted approximately 30 minutes. The task consisted of a 5-second exposure to two groups ofCVC trigrams followed by a 15-second rehearsal time. The subjects were then asked to record in writing their recall of the stimulus. Each group received five practice trials I followed by ten test trials. The dependent variable was the number of letters recalled correctly in the correct position.The results of the study were analyzed through multiple regression analysis with age as a covariate. While short-term recall was shown to correlate with age at the .001 level, there were no significant differences among the treatment groups. Consequently, the results of this investigation did not support the hypothesis that instruction in overt dactylic or articulatory rehearsal would significantly improve short-term recall of visually-presented verbal material in deaf students. Nor did the study indicate that the method of overt rehearsal employed would produce significantly different results.

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It is known that the educational and social development of all children and young people are affected by the quality of communication within the family and by participation in social life and in activities outwith school. Although deaf children tend to under-achieve educationally and to experience marginalisation within mainstream groups, relatively little research has been located within family and out-of-school domains. This thesis interrogates data which were collected as part of a national questionnaire-based survey of parents of deaf children in Scotland. Quantitative and qualitative analyses of responses to closed and open questions illuminate parental perspectives on the extent to which deafness-related issues influenced: the quality of communication between their deaf children and family members; levels of friendships with both deaf and hearing peers; the amount and nature of their children’s participation in cultural and structured social activities; and parental facilitation of their adolescent deaf children’s independence. Although the majority of respondents indicated no, or minimal, disadvantages, a sizeable minority reported specific linguistic and social barriers which influenced key relationships and, in the case of activities, precipitated marginalising experiences. Whilst some clear patterns are revealed, such as a correlation with level of hearing loss and, in terms of parent/child quality of communication, with the hearing status of parents, there was a persistent level of unexplained diversity among those experiencing linguistic barriers. Limitations to the data restrict the generalisability of findings, although these have import in themselves. In addition, new knowledge is derived from the application of symbolic capital as a heuristic lens. Evidence of the diversity of family communication and ‘visitorship’ experiences are viewed in the context of linguistic access strategy choices emanating from the complexity of each deaf child’s habitus. Indications of differences between children of deaf and hearing parents, in terms of the balance of linguistic benefits and disadvantages, are considered in the context of social and cultural capital which is accumulated through access to alternative deaf and hearing networks. It is posited that, in order for deaf children to be enabled to realise their highly individual linguistic potential, and to optimise their accumulation of cultural and social capital, there is a need to address the imbalance within the linguistic spectrum of assessments and resources provided by specialist educational services. It is further argued that this should be within the context of a positive conceptualisation of deafness, and a holistic approach to assessment and service provision.

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Improved techniques (particularly electrical apparatus) make it possible to teach hearing-handicapped children the use of language at an age when their motivation and their capabilities for this learning are at their peak. The result has been to ease considerably, the burden of basic educational training, and also to permit the balancing of this with the broader socialization of the child. This makes early diagnosis more important than ever; but it also makes family participation a vital ingredient. Two companion studies - one concentrating on the pre-school child, and the other on the school-aged child - have been undertaken to sharpen this part of the focus - the family, parental, and related influences which bear on the progress in his early years now possible for the hearing-handicapped child. With the co-operation of the Parent-Teachers Association of the Jericho Hill School, and the School personnel, information was obtained from some eighty parents of children of school age residing in British Columbia, who responded to a questionnaire enquiry. This was followed by interviews with families living within Great Vancouver. The area of enquiry included a) the implications of the handicap, and b) the contributions made by parents in the treatment of the child; an assessment being made of more helpful and less helpful family situations respectively. Information and interpretation is an evident need, for both children and parents, and as training potential as well as behaviour consequences. Attributes which distinguish the more helpful family from the less helpful are indicated. Some general findings relate to (a) community attitudes and (b) services for the hearing-handicapped child. Because of its exploratory nature, this study must leave several questions unanswered; but the importance of early diagnosis and co-operative relationships between clinics, parents, and school, are clearly indicated. Social Work Services are particularly relevant if the differential needs of children (in family terms as well as degrees of hearing loss) are to be met. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate