Abstract
Role play is an opportunity to ‘act’ and ‘interact’ with peers. It lightens up the atmospheres and brings liveliness in the classes. Students learn to use the language in a more realistic and practical way. Thus they can become more aware of the usefulness and practicality of language. Role play is indeed a useful teaching technique which should be experimented and applied by teachers more often in the classroom.
Many children with mental retardation experience difficulties in language and communication development. Since there is a apparent problem in communication as well as in the development of language skills due to limited cognitive capacity of children with mental retardation (MR), it seems that in many cases, valuable opportunities for developing language and communication skills of children with mental retardation are missed. The present study is titled as “Effect of Role Play on Developing Communication Skills of Children with Moderate Mental Retardation”. In order to find out the effectiveness of role play on developing communication skills of children with moderate MR, ten children with moderate mental retardation were selected from DCMR special school, Trivandrum using purposive sampling technique. Pre-test, post-test single group design was used. Investigator developed a communication skill checklist for pre-test and post-test, it includes verbal and non-verbal skills. Experimental group received 30 days intervention on role play, developed by the researcher based on the skills selected for the assessment. The data obtained was analysed by applying mean, standard deviation and ‘t’test. The result showed that the role play practice method has a significant effect (p<0.001 level) on developing communication skills of children with moderate mental retardation.
Lecturer, Inter University Centre for Disability Studies, Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam
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