A new speech training system for profoundly deaf children
Yoshinori Yamada, Norio Murata, Tatsuo Oka · The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America · 1988
A new speech training system based on a personal computer has been developed. Monitoring of the articulatory movements and speech sounds of individuals was accomplished using five sensors: a microphone, a neck sensor for vocal cord vibration, a nose sensor for nasal sound, an expiratory airflow sensor, and a tongue position sensor. Signals from these sensors were processed in real time by a DSP to extract ten training parameters that are useful for prosodic or phonemic training. These parameters were transferred to an MSX personal computer every 10 ms and were displayed on a color CRT screen together with a training model in front of which the trainee repeatedly practices his speech. Such training was conducted for profoundly deaf children (aged 4–6) for 2 years at the School for the Deaf, University of Tsukuba, and has been enthusiastically accepted and used. After 2 years of this training, remarkable improvements in the intelligibility of monosyllables were attained that had not been attained by conventional methods.