Manager of the National Cued Speech Association Information Services
I. Cued Speech: An Overview
Cued Speech makes spoken languages visible. It provides cued hearing, cued speechreading, cued phonemes and cued languages. Cued Speech is an integrated multi-sensory system. Its use supports auditory discrimination, speechreading, articulation, and phonics instruction for children and adults with a variety of hearing, speech, and language needs.
For individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing, Cued Speech is compatible with auditory, oral, bilingual, and total communication philosophies. Communication choice need not be an either / or decision, as each communication system has its specific qualities, to be selected purposefully at any point in time. Cued Speech is key to developing language in the appropriate phonemic base for literacy.
II. Defining Cued Speech:
Cued Speech is a visual communication system which, in American English, uses the natural mouth movements of speech in combination with eight handshapes (which distinguish consonant phonemes) in four different locations near the mouth (to distinguish vowel phonemes). The cues added to the mouth movements make all the phonemes of spoken language look different. Consonants are 'cued' in vowel locations, allowing the cues to be synchronized with the spoken language, syllable by syllable.
III. The Purpose of Cued Speech:
Literacy is the original and primary goal of Cued Speech. It was developed in 1966 by R. Orin Cornett, Ph.D. at Gallaudet University, to enable hearing parents to communicate in their native spoken language and allow their deaf children to 'see-hear' their language and pick it up naturally, similarly to children who are hearing. Cued Speech has been adapted to more than 55 languages and dialects.
IV. Who uses Cued Speech?
A. Persons who are concerned for those with speech, hearing, and language needs: Parents, family members, special educators, speech-language pathologists, interpreters/transliterators for the deaf, audiologists, reading teachers, grandparents, baby-sitters and friends.
B. Parents who are Deaf:
For children whose parents are deaf and whose native language is American Sign Language, Cued Speech can be used at school by teachers whose native language is English to facilitate the child's acquisition of English as a second language. Some Deaf parents take advantage of this opportunity to build their own English language skills.
C. Children and adults with hearing, speech, and language needs.
Whether an individual is able to hear or is deaf or hard-of-hearing, Cued Speech provides sensory-integrated communication, making spoken sounds visually and physically clear to avoid confusion and frustration. Cued Speech is used for phonics/phonemics instruction, for articulation therapy and to address a number of learning disabilities. For individuals unable to speak, Nu-Vue-Cue adapts Cued Speech into a grid.
D. Adults who are deaf or hard of hearing.
Adults who acquired language through Cued Speech at home and/or school use cues and speech for communication along with other modes as appropriate. Adults who have progressive or sudden losses appreciate the assistance of Cued Speech in overcoming the frustration of speechreading and in maintaining functional speech.
V. Results of Cued Speech use:
A. Audition: Cued Speech enhances the processing of auditory information. Cued Speech breaks through the confusion of incomplete and distorted sound. Profoundly deaf people make significant and continuing improvement in speech discrimination when they use Cued Speech.
B. Cochlear Implants and Cued Speech: Personal accounts and research indicate that children and youth who are accustomed to Cued Speech and then receive a cochlear implant are able to expedite the transition to the phonemes they receive through the implant. Implant users of all ages appreciate the assistance of Cued Speech in difficult listening situations. Children who were born deaf and use Cued Speech are more easily habilitated after cochlear implant surgery than those without the benefit of this 'sound' connection.
C. Speech. Combined with traditional practices in speech and auditory therapy, Cued Speech provides the therapist with a tool to identify targets. Children and adults with auditory disabilities see what sound is to be articulated, how words are pronounced, the pattern of phonemes, and can self-correct their own speech when they participate in Cued conversation.
D. Language. Deaf children tested after consistent use of Cued Speech for four or more years have mastered the syntax and grammar of English and other spoken languages. Deaf students using Cued Speech often become bilingual and multi-lingual.
E. Reading / Literacy. Children who acquire language through Cued Speech generally attain equivalent language and reading levels as if they were not deaf. Profoundly deaf students who communicate with Cued Speech read as well as hearing students and use the same reading strategies. Most students who use Cued Speech enroll in regular classes, preschool through college, and make use of Cued Speech transliterators, who provide inclusion with EASE (Equal Access to the Sound Environment). Cued Speech has been shown to enhance and accelerate phonemic awareness and phonics instruction with hearing and hearing-impaired children.
F. Speechreading. Continuous exposure to Cued Speech improves speechreading in cued and non-cued situations.
VI. Additional Observations:
CS parents retain their use of cueing and continue communicating easily and completely with their deaf child into adolescence. CS, by enabling easy and complete communication with parents, provides for better behavior and emotional well-being in deaf children. CS aids children and adults with auditory processing problems and other hearing, speech, and language needs.
VII. References/Additional Readings:
WEST COAST CUED SPEECH PROGRAMS
(NCSA Affiliate)
348 Cernon Street, Suite D; Vacaville CA 95688
707-448-4060; LRupert601@aol.com
SUNSHINE STATES CUED SPEECH SERVICES
(NCSA Affiliate)
Barbara Caldwell, 4442 Bay Shore Road; Sarasota FL 34234
941-355-4194 v/tty/fax; cueflorida@classic.msn.com
NEW YORK CUED SPEECH CENTER
(NCSA Affiliate)
825 East 18th Street; Brooklyn NY 11230
718-434-7406 v; 718-434-4429 tty; NYCuedSpC@aol.com
AEHI / AG BELL MONTESSORI SCHOOL
(NCSA Affiliate)
2020 E. Camp McDonald Road; Mt. Prospect IL 60056
847-297-3206; agbms@uss.net
AUDITORY LEARNING CENTER (NCSA Affiliate)
304 East Jones St; Raleigh NC 27601
919-828-1218; NCCUE@sprynet.com
WEB: www.ingenweb.com/cuedspeech
European Centers (unaffiliated) include:
CUED SPEECH ASSOCIATION U.K.
Corner House, Bay View, Stoke Fleming, Dartmouth, Devon, TQ6 0QX England
[011-44-1] 770-944-01804 v; 770-946-01803 tty/fax
info@cuedspeech.freeserve.co.uk
A.L.P.C.
21 rue des 4 Freres Peignot; Paris France 75015
[011-33-1] 45 79 14 05 V; 45 78 96 14 fax
alpc@wanadoo.fr; WEB: assoc.wanadoo.fr/alpc
CREDAG NARCIS MASO / CE ìLA MA«ANAî
Av. Folch i Torres, n_6; 17190 SALT (Girona); SPAIN
[011-34] 972 23 59 30 FAX [011-34] 972 40 17 92
Official information, regional and local contacts, learning opportunities, self-instruction lessons, product catalog and links to other websites are available at www.cuedspeech.org
For more information and a current catalog, contact:
National Cued Speech Association
23970 Hermitage Road
Cleveland OH 44122-4008
216-292-6213 v/tty or 800-459-3529 v/tty
Cuedspdisc@aol.com
