The Deaf Child and Solving Problems of Arithmetic: The Importance of Comprehensive Reading

Abstract

The present investigation is informed by two major considerations. First, the need for teachers to know more about the difficulties experienced by the deaf child when presented with written mathematical problems. Second, the idea of the relationship between linguistic competence in deaf subjects and their difficulties in the comprehension of verbal messages. In particular, the present article analizes the influence of reading comprehension level on the solution of verbally expressed problems of arithmetic. The results indicate that reading comprehension level is clearly related to the problem-solving level of deaf subjects. In general, if the deaf are unable to understand the verbally presented problem, they will not be able to solve it correctly.

Arithmetic School Readiness of Preschoolers with Hearing Impairment

“…This is evident from the mean scores provided in Table 5. Similar observations were made in earlier studies by Pau (1995) and Wood et al, (1983), Nunes and Moreno (2002), Swanwick et al (2005). They too observed that children with hearing impairment performed poorer than typically developing children on the tasks evaluated by them.…”

“…Similarly, Pau (1995) found that children with hearing impairment studying in primary school had difficulty comprehending verbal mathematical problems. This led to the children having considerable difficulty in arithmetic problem solving.…”

“…Evidence from literature indicates that children with hearing impairment perform poorer in academics compared to their hearing peers (Nunes, 2004;Nunes & Moreno, 2002;Powers, Gregory, & Thoutenhoofd, 1999;Swanwick, Oddy, & Roper, 2005). Besides having difficulties in language, several studies have demonstrated that children with hearing impairment have considerable problems in mathematical abilities (Nunes & Moreno, 2002;Pagliaro & Kritzer, 2013;Pau, 1995;Stewart & Kluwin, 2001;Wood, Wood, & Howarth, 1983). Stewart and Kluwin (2001) found school-going children with hearing impairment to be underachievers in mathematics.…”

Dealing with Digits : Arithmetic, Memory and Phonology in Deaf Signers

“…Specifically, hearing individuals perform better than deaf signers on relational statements (e.g. less than, more than, twice as many as; Kelly et al, 2003;Serrano Pau, 1995), arithmetic words problems that require reading (Hyde, Zevenbergen, & Power, 2003), fractions (Titus, 1995) and multiplicative reasoning (Nunes et al, 2009). The establishment of arithmetic facts and verbal number representations in deaf individuals might be altered or delayed, due to weaker associations between concepts and a high reliance on item-specific, compared to relational, processing (Marschark, 2003;Marschark, Convertino, McEvoy, & Masteller, 2004).…”

Pensamento e linguagem: a língua de sinais na resolução de problemas

“…Vale lembrar que, a literatura especializada aponta que os problemas de comparação do tipo que utilizamos são, efetivamente, complexos, tanto para os surdos quanto para os ouvintes (ver, por exemplo, Carpenter, & Moser, 1983;Hiebert, Carpenter, & Moser, 1982;Kintsch, & Greeno, 1985;Serrano-Pau, 1995;Vergnaud, 1991), de modo que a sua dificuldade não pode ser justificada nem pela limitação bioló-gica do sujeito que é surdo, nem por uma suposta limitação lingüística. Tanto é que a 1 a parte desta fase, isto é, aquela realizada junto ao professor surdo, evidenciou que a limitação do surdo frente a problemas de comparação envolvendo a relação "n a mais" e "n a menos" pode estar relacionada ao modo como este conceito é mediado em LIBRAS.…”