Adaptation of a Rehabilitation Program for Prosody and Its Application on Egyptian Hearing Impaired Children

Prosody is the melody and rhythm of speech, it is used to refer to the supra segmental aspects of speech including pitch, loudness and duration. Variations in these features achieve different prosodic functions and are perceived by the listener as meaningful changes. The role of prosody in language acquisition and effective communication is documented in research. Nevertheless, prosodic intervention in children with hearing impairment received less attention compared to other speech and language areas. The aim of this study is to adapt the \"prosody treatment program\", an evidence based rehabilitation program, and to detect the efficacy of its activities in improving the prosodic skills of Egyptian hearing impaired children. The \"prosody treatment program\" is an evidence-based practice targeting receptive and expressive prosodic skills in addition to speech production, intelligibility, pragmatics and phonology. The program is applied using a systematic approach of providing cues following the principles adapted from dynamic temporal and tactile cueing (DTTC) for speech motor learning to help accelerate the child\'s learning of the prosodic skills targeted in this program. The program was translated to Arabic and adapted to be suitable for the Egyptian children.