Tadoma
|
|
Tadoma is a method developed at the Perkins School for the Blind in Massachusetts for teaching a student with dual sensory impairments (see deafblindness) to speak. It is a difficult method and rarely used.
The student's thumb is placed on the speaker's lips and the fingers on the cheek and neck. The student feels all the physical aspects of speech, the air in the cheeks, the movement of the lips and the vibration of the vocal cords. The student then tries to repeat those physical aspects while touching his or her own face.
Tadoma is also used by a few deafblind people in everyday communication. The deafblind person places their fingers and thumb on the neck of the person who is speaking and uses the tactile information provided to understand the speaker's words.