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  • Training Voice-Pitch Contro...
    FUKUDA, Yumiko

    The Japanese Journal of Special Education, 1988/11/30, Letnik: 26, Številka: 3
    Journal Article

    In the early education of infants with hearing impairments, dancing to songs is often used in auditory and speech training. Prosodic features, an important aspect of speech, especially for children with hearing impairments, are based on the perception of intensity, fundamental frequency, and duration. These elements are commonly used in the perception of music. Therefore, in the present study, in expectation of the stimulating effect of musical training on speech training, it was planned to train children to control their voice pitch using a musical scale display, and to combine the training of voice-pitch control systematically with that of word accent and sentence intonation. Using a visual display of time-variation in the fundamental frequency of speech, 5 children between 4 and 5 years old, with moderate or severe hearing impairments, were trained on utterances of word accent and sentence intonation. In the first stage of training, controlling the pitch of the voice from high to low, or low to high, was trained, using the musical scale for the display of the fundamental frequency of the speech. Then the children were trained to speak with word accent and sentence intonation, monitoring their voice pitch on a display of time-varying curve on a logarithmic scale of fundamental frequency. The children were able to achieve normal speaking with a rather short period of training. Based on the observation of the process of their progress, a practical procedure of training voice-pitch control by the use of visual display is proposed. The method of selecting speech materials that are suitable for training word accent and sentence intonation in the utterances of hearing-impaired children is also discussed.