Use of connected discourse tracking to train functional speech skills

The connected discourse tracking procedure was adopted for use as a production training task for profoundly hearing-impaired children. A clinician served as the receiver and 5 children with profound hearing losses each served as the sender for 16 tracking sessions. There were individual differences among the children in their ability to convey the connected discourse to the clinician over time. The increase in comprehension of each subject's speech during the last session relative to the amount of information understood during the first session ranged from 0 to 48%. Two independent observers were used during the first and last sessions to verify the tracking results obtained by the clinician (the primary receiver). There were differences in words tracked per minute among the three receivers with the primary clinician achieving higher tracking rates than the other two. The children learned how to use discourse strategies when they were not understood and they were highly motivated by the task. The results indicate that it is feasible to incorporate the procedure in a speech training program for hearing-impaired children.