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 Background and aim: Dyslexia is a language learning disorder which leads to some impairment in written language including reading and spelling. Children with dyslexia are mostly suffering in areas like Morphology, Phonology, semantic and pragmatic. Thus the main purpose of this study is to investigate the morphological awareness, as a significant aspect in reading components (Speed, accuracy and understanding) in which the children are impaired. 

Material and Methods: In the current study, 27 dyslexic students and 57 normal students in second grade of primary school participated. Existence of dyslexia was determined through administrating a reading test of "Nama", and in order to be sure that none of the students of normal group has language deficit, the language development test "TOLD" was administrated on normal students. In order to assess morphological knowledge of participants, a morphological awareness test was administrated too. In addition to determine the reading speed, accuracy and comprehension, the "NAMA" subtests were employed. Data obtained, were analyzed with the help of inferential statistical methods such as linear Pearson correlation coefficient test, Spearman test, Normal Kolmogrov - Smirnov test, T-test and linear regression test (ANOVA).

Result: Correlation coefficient between morphological awareness and reading speed in whole sample was calculated to be -0.9158, that of morphological awareness and reading accuracy was 0.9514, and that of morphological awareness and reading comprehension was 0.926. This shows significant correlation among morphological awareness and components of reading skill. While the same correlation coefficients, in dyslexic children were respectively -0.689, 0.1403 and 0.1062. It shows that there was not significant relationship in dyslexic children. The T-test also indicated that morphological awareness, reading comprehension skills, reading speed and reading accuracy skills had significant meaningful differences between two groups.

Conclusion: morphological awareness, reading speed, accuracy and comprehension, were in a lower level among dyslexic children in comparison with normal children, and this can be regarded as one linguistic aspect that can be effectual in reading speed, accuracy and comprehension. However among the dyslexic children whose difficulties were limited to the word level (e.g. dyslexic group sample), morphological awareness did not have any influence on their reading skills.Key words: Morphological awareness, reading speed, reading accuracy,reading comprehension, dyslexia

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Background and aim: The communicative functioning of children who stutter can be assessed in a variety of ways. Standardized tests are an important tool to assess communication skills particularly in stuttering children .The purpose of the present study was to translate the Test of childhood Stuttering (TOCS) into persian and investigation of validity and reliability of the test .
Materials and methods: In this research, 40 stutterers and 40 non-stutterer were evaluated. After the translation of the Test according to Protocol IQOLA and its equalization to Persian Language, Content validity and Face validity of it were determined by the opinions of experts. Then, for concurrent validity determination 80 stutterer and non-stutterer children were examined by TOCS and SSI3 .In order to test reliability, test -retest and Cronbach,s alpha were used.
Results: Entirely relevant items had simple translation. The translation items had content and face validity correlation between the marks of TOCS and SSI3 (p=0.000, r= %92). TOCS has high Test-retest ( p=0.000, ICC= %97) and internal reliability (p=0.000,α=%90).
Conclusion: Persian equalized TOCS (Test of childhood stuttering) have high validity and reliability. it might be useful to differentiate stuttering children among normal ones.

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Background and Aim: Auditory discrimination is one component of central auditory processing skills or auditory perception, that has an important role in acquisition and production of speech sounds. Auditory discrimination test is a tool for screening or diagnosis of auditory discrimination. The aim of this study is to investigate of auditory discrimination development process in 4-6 years old children in Semnan city. 

Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional survey was done on 200 normal 4-6 years old children in semnan city. Auditory discrimination skill was evaluated by Wepman auditory discrimination test (WADT) .The level of significancy in this study was 0.05.

 Results: Auditory discrimination skills based on percentage of 5 and 95 for 4 years old children were 20 and 36, 21.85 and 38 for 5 years old, 23.30 and 39.35 for 6 years old children. There was significant differences between 4 years old children with 5 and 6 years old children In auditory discrimination skill (P=0.003), but there  was no significant difference between 5 and 6 years old children(P=0.21). In addition, auditory discrimination test scores between boys and girls were not significant (P=0.34).

Conclusion: Results of this study showed that children ability in discrimination of sounds was increased with age.

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Background and Aim: Reading skill is necessary for academic achievement, that deaf children have problems in this skill due to hearing impairment. Use of cochlear implant can improve auditory inputs. The aim of this study was to investigate the reading skills of children with cochlear implants and comparing that with normal ones.

Materials and Methods: This descriptive - analytic study was done on 24 children with cochlear implant and 24 normal ones that was selected from second and third grades students of Tehran primary schools. Children's reading performance was assessed by Nama reading test and the data were analyzed using T-test, linear regression and Pearson correlations.

Results: The results showed that the means of reading scores of normal children were significantly greater than the cochlear implanted ones (P<0.01). Also, there was a significant relationship between reading skills and period of cochlear implant (P<0.01).

Conclusion: Cochlear implanted children showed weaker performance in reading skills than normal ones due to less access to auditory and Phonological information. It seems that early surgery and cochlear implant before the age of language learning can be partially compensated reading defects of deaf children.

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Background and Aim: Oral feeding difficulties are common in children with cerebral palsy. Early oral motor interventions may improve oral feeding skills in these children. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effect of intervention duration of oral motor stimulation on feeding skills in spastic cerebral palsy.

  

Materials and Methods: Twelve children with spastic cerebral palsy 2-7 years aged were participated into two groups A and B. Children in the group A received oral-motor stimulation for 12 session(3 days per week) and group B received stimulation program for 24 session(3 days per week).Feeding skills was assessed using Oral Motor Assessment Scale (OMAS). Data were analyzed using Friedman and Mann-Whitney tests.

  

Results : The results of the study revealed a significant improvement in feeding skills for both groups. The B group had significantly advanced in mouth closure, lip closure on utensil and sucking straw than children in group A (P<0.05). The difference between two group in control of food during deglutition, mastication and control of liquid during deglutition was not significant (P>0.05).There was difference in the total score of feeding skills was not significant between the two groups (P>0.05).

  

Conclusion: Oral-motor intervention might be improved feeding performance in children with cerebral palsy but continuation (increased duration) of intervention improved specific components of feeding behaviors.

  

Key Words: Spastic cerebral palsy, Feeding skills, Oral motor stimulation

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Background and Aim: Theory of mind as a cognitive component is the foundation of our ability to explain or predict the behavior of ourselves and others which is done through the attribution of mental status. This ability damaged in deaf children and its development is fast in girls. The aim of this study was to study theory of mind in 5-6 years cochlear implant children and its relation with gender and age of cochlear implant (CI).

Materials and Methods:  This study is descriptive and cross-sectional. Eighteen Farsi speaking children CI children and 18 normal development children aged 5-6 were participated in this study. The normal children were selected from living area of CI children. They were selected through available and easy sampling method. These children had no sensory or speech disorders. The basic theory of mind was tested in these children.

Results: Theory of mind was significantly different in both groups (p = 0.00). The comparison between girls and boys did not show significant difference in normal (p= 0.321) and CI children (p =0.231). There was no significant relationship between the age at CI and theory of mind scores (p=0.100).

Conclusion: Hearing impairment has influence on basic theory development in CI children. Age of implantation and gender had no effect on development of theory of mind.

Keywords: Theory of mind, Cochlear implant, Farsi language.