@article{oai:kanazawa-u.repo.nii.ac.jp:00048781,
 author = {外山, 稔 and 能登谷, 晶子 and 原田, 浩美 and 中谷, 謙 and 杉本, 寿史 and 石丸, 正 and 吉崎, 智一 and Toyama, Minoru and Notoya, Masako and Harada, Hiromi and Nakatani, Ken and Sugimoto, Hisashi and Ishimaru, Tadashi and Yoshizaki, Tomokazu},
 issue = {1},
 journal = {Journal of wellness and health care, Journal of wellness and health care},
 month = {Aug},
 note = {Objectives: To examine predictors of syllable extraction proficiency, a prerequisite for
children with hearing impairments progressing from spoken to written language by the
Kanazawa Method.
Background: The rates of delayed language acquisition in children with hearing
impairments have remained unchanged despite increased use of cochlear implants. Children
born with hearing deficiencies do not receive sufficient auditory inputs, which contributes
to delayed acquisition of spoken language. As spoken language is the springboard to
written language, such children are likely to experience delays in acquisition of syllable
awareness and written language when taught in the same way as children without hearing
impairments. However, most research on syllable awareness in children with hearing
impairments in Japan is related to studies targeting school-age children and later. Therefore,
it remains unclear how to manage syllable awareness problems in pre-school-age children.
Methods: This study was conducted on 68 children with hearing impairments, between 4 and
6 years of age, diagnosed by the Kanazawa University Hospital with congenital deafness before
the age of 4 years and receiving outpatient language instruction. To examine the predictors of
syllable extraction scores, we performed multiple-regression analysis with syllable extraction as
the dependent variable and age, unaided hearing level, and scores for remaining language skills
(auditory word comprehension, syllabification, syllable extraction, written language character
recognition, and written language sentence comprehension) as independent variables.
Results: Stepwise regression analysis showed that written language character recognition
score, age, and auditory word comprehension score contributed to the syllable extraction score.
Discussion: The relationship between syllable extraction proficiency and age was consistent
with previous reports. Early intervention targeting character recognition and auditory word
comprehension assisted the teaching of written language and improved syllable awareness
in children with hearing impairments. The results of this study indicated that early-stage
intervention in written language character recognition and auditory word comprehension is
an effective method of teaching children with hearing impairments to facilitate acquisition
of written language and the development of syllable awareness. The vocabulary and syllable
awareness acquired by exposure to a combination of spoken language, Japanese sign language,
and written language can be easily transferred to speechreading. Using the Kanazawa Method
to facilitate understanding of the structure of Japanese language can help children with hearing
impairments to acquire syllable extraction proficiency, regardless of their unaided hearing level.},
 pages = {23--34},
 title = {An investigation into the syllable-extraction skills of children with hearing impairments by the Kanazawa Method},
 volume = {43},
 year = {2019}
}