This paper presents the relationship between Korean EFL learners' self-reporting learning style preferences and their perspectives on ELT materials evaluation. Quantitative data was acquired from 521 subjects' responses to a learning style survey and a questionnaire of materials evaluation checklist. The findings show that Korean EFL learners'…

In recent years, increasing attention has been given to the development of deaf children, though few studies have included Deaf parents. The present study examined emotional availability (EA) and functions of touch used by Deaf or hearing parents with hearing or deaf infants during free play. Sixty dyads representing four hearing status groups…

Little is known about how persons with congenital deaf-blindness use hand movements efficiently for exploring different objects with different textures in different tasks. More knowledge in this area would contribute to the adaptations of educational strategies for encouraging touch and tactile exploration. The study presented in this article…

Our interaction with digital resources is becoming increasingly based on touch, gestures, and now also eye movement. Many everyday consumer electronics products already include touch-based interfaces, from e-book readers to tablets, and from the last personal computers to the GPS system in your car. What implications do these new forms of…

A map exploration and representation exercise was conducted with participants who were totally blind. Representations of maritime environments were presented either with a tactile map or with a digital haptic virtual map. We assessed the knowledge of spatial configurations using a triangulation technique. The results revealed that both types of…

This paper reports on the findings from individual interviews and focus group discussions involving six teachers implementing the Singapore Mathematics Curriculum (SMC) in the Foundation Phase (Grade R to Grade 3) in a school in South Africa. The interviews presented an opportunity to explore teachers' experiences with their attempts to use the…

While research indicates that technology can be useful for supporting learning and collaboration, there is still relatively little uptake or widespread implementation of these technologies in classrooms. In this paper, we explore one aspect of the development of a multi-touch classroom, looking at two different designs of the classroom environment…

Thirty-four children, with autism spectrum disorders, ages 4-14 years, were matched and randomly assigned to one of two conditions for learning a novel juice-making task and producing two novel words about the event. Seventeen sighted children were manually guided to perform the task and tactually prompted during imitated productions of novel…

As people age, they naturally experience sensory, perceptual, and cognitive changes. Many of these changes necessitate adaptations in designing programs for older adults. Choral singing is an activity that has many potential benefits for older adults, yet the rehearsal environment, presentation style, and content of material presented may need to…

Previous studies suggested that primary somatosensory (SI) neurons in well-trained monkeys participated in the haptic-haptic unimodal delayed matching-to-sample (DMS) task. In this study, 585 SI neurons were recorded in monkeys performing a task that was identical to that in the previous studies but without requiring discrimination and active…

A systematic review identified tactile assessments used in children with cerebral palsy (CP), but their reproducibility is unknown. Sixteen children with unilateral CP and 31 typically developing children (TDC) were assessed 2-4 weeks apart. Test-retest percent agreements within one point for children with unilateral CP (and TDC) were…

Introduction: The BlindAid, a virtual system developed for orientation and mobility (O&M) training of people who are blind or have low vision, allows interaction with different virtual components (structures and objects) via auditory and haptic feedback. This research examined if and how the BlindAid that was integrated within an O&M…

The perceived distance between touches on a single skin surface is larger on regions of high tactile sensitivity than those with lower acuity, an effect known as "Weber's illusion". This illusion suggests that tactile size perception involves a representation of the perceived size of body parts preserving characteristics of the somatosensory…

This study investigated the ability of preterm infants to learn an object shape with one hand and discriminate a new shape in the opposite hand (without visual control). Twenty-four preterm infants between 33 and 34 + 6 gestational weeks received a tactile habituation task with either their right or left hand followed by a tactile discrimination…

The author tested the hypothesis that attachment to comfort objects is based on the sensory processing characteristics of the individual. Fifty-two undergraduate students with and without a childhood comfort object reported sensory responses and performed a tactile threshold task. Those with a comfort object described their object and rated their…