A woman who drinks alcohol while being pregnant puts her child at risk of numerous birth defects that can negatively affect a child’s cognition, physical growth and behaviour. It is called Fetal Alcohol Syndrome – FAS. Among all these dysfunctions, hearing problems might occur, including the disorders of phonematic hearing and phonematic analysis which result in improper executive functioning. The deficits in executive functioning can lead to real-life implications. According to studies, the children’s ability to operate phonemes should develop with age. Approximately sixty per cent of six-year-old children and almost all ten-year-old children successfully perform phoneme analysis. Undoubtedly, this ability is strongly connected with reading and writing, that is, the basic skills for school children. However, studies on FAS children show that only twenty per cent of sixyear- olds and fifty per cent of ten-year-olds can manage the task of phoneme operations. It is a natural consequence of the problems with memorising sounds and the linear order of words. This failure in developing the skill of phoneme analysis in children leads to dysfunctions in reading and writing.
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No. 8 (2019)
Published: 2019-12-22