ASSESSMENT OF PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS IN CHILDREN WITH MILD INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY

Abstract

Children with mild intellectual disability need highly professional treatment in order to achieve maximum functioning in the performance of daily activities in society. Phonological awareness as a prerequisite for healthy and correct speech-language development, in children with mild intellectual disability, is not sufficiently examined by special educators and speech and language pathologist in their daily practice. The aim of this research is to assess phonological awareness in children with mild intellectual disability. For the purposes of this research, 50 children with mild intellectual disability and a control group of 50 children with typical development are included. The groups are composed of students from the second to the fifth grade who attend classes in the territory of the Republic of North Macedonia. For the purposes of this research, the “SLP.Bojan - Test for Assessment of Phonological Awareness” was used as an instrument. The results show that students with mild intellectual disabilities have a significant impairment of phonological awareness compared to students with typical development. We conclude that phonological awareness, as a prerequisite for the healthy development of a large number of important segments in the child's development, should be promptly and always assessed by special educators and speech-language pathologists, as well as its disorders should be promptly and appropriately treated.