The evaluation of early mathematical reasoning skills in children with cochlear implantation

The aim of this study was to compare mathematical reasoning skills of preschool children with cochlear implants and normal hearing children and to determine the effect of cochlear implant use on mathematical reasoning skills. The study was carried out in İzmir Ege University Medical Faculty Hospital Otorhinolaryngology (ENT) Department.22 Children attending special education center and kindergarten with cochlear implant and 22 normal hearing children attending kindergarten, participated in the research and all of them was pre-school period (60-72 months) and matched by age and sex. The "Early Mathematical Reasoning Skills Assessment Tool (MAYBDA), which was developed by Ayşegül Ergül in 2014, was applied to the children participating in the study. There are 40 questions in the evaluation tool consisting of various pictures and materials. The implementation of the assessment tool was carried out in an individual interview with the children. The findings of the study were analyzed by Mann-Whitney U, Kruskal-Wallis H, spearman's rho tests. As a result of the research; According to the scores obtained from MAYBDA, children of cohlear implant were found to be behind the normal hearing peers in all areas. In addition, the effect of cochlear implant age, age of hearing loss diagnosis, age of commencement of special education, duration of cochlear implantation, duration of special education and the level of mother-father education were evaluated. According to this, it was determined that the scores did not differ according to the age of the diagnosis of hearing loss, and that, according to the age of the cochlear implant and the age of the special education, there was a significant difference in the "area questions" in MAYBDA. Again, according to the level of father education, there was no significant difference in the scores of the children with cochlear implant and normal hearing. According to the mother education level, children whose mothers have high school or higher education level were found higher level than the children whose mothers have primary education level and the difference was significant in the cohlear implant group. No difference was found between mothers in normal hearing groups according to their education level. A positive correlation was found between the duration of cochlear implant use and the duration of special training and the scores in the assessment tool.