1986 Volume 27 Issue 3 Pages 209-214
Language development was observed in infants with impaired hearing. The subjects were two infants with severely impaired hearing, a boy and a girl. Both used FM hearing aids in place of usual hearing aids.
The boy, his mother, and his teacher played together, outdoors and indoors. Outdoors they watched cars coming and going. Indoors they played with toy cars. When the subject was one year and ten months old, he saw a car coming backward and said “back”, his first word. He had developed his language through his symbolic playing with toy cars.
The girl, her mother, and her teacher also played together both outdoors and indoors. They played with dogs, cats, and butterflies. The subject tried to follow butterflies and began to utter loudly. She was also very fond of playing with toy dinner sets. When she was one year and six months old, she said “bye-bye”, her first word, to her teacher and waved her hand. She too had developed her language through her symbolic playing with dolls and toy dinner sets.
