Non-Verbal (Sign Language) To Verbal Language Translator Using Convolutional Neural Network

Communication is very imperative for daily life. Normal people use verbal language for communication while people with disabilities use sign language for communication. Sign language is a way of communicating by using the hand gestures and parts of the body instead of speaking and listening. As not all people are familiar with sign language, there lies a language barrier. There has been much research in this field to remove this barrier. There are mainly 2 ways in which we can convert the sign language into speech or text to close the gap, i.e. , Sensor based technique,and Image processing. In this paper we will have a look at the Image processing technique, for which we will be using the Convolutional Neural Network (CNN). So, we have built a sign detector, which will recognise the sign numbers from 1 to 10. It can be easily extended to recognise other hand gestures including alphabets (A- Z) and expressions. We are creating this model based on Indian Sign Language(ISL). Keywords: Multi Level Perceptron (MLP), Convolutional Neural Network (CNN), Indian Sign Language(ISL), Region of interest(ROI), Artificial Neural Network(ANN), VGG 16(CNN vision architecture model), SGD(Stochastic Gradient Descent).

DEVELOPMENT OF VERBAL CREATIVITY BY BILINGUAL AND ENGLISH AS FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNERS IN KINDERGARTEN TO 8TH GRADE SCHOOLS

Bilingualism has long been within the scope of creativity studies that investigate creativity and problem solving. This study aims to explore the possible effect of bilingualism on the verbal creativity of English language learners. Participants from a bilingual and an English as foreign language teaching program within the same school were selected as an experimental and a control group respectively to compare verbal creativity. A series of creative English writing tasks designed by the authors were assigned to a total of 86 third grade (aged 7–8) students. Both the English as foreign language group (N = 42) and the bilingual group (N = 44) were subject to assessment and evaluation in terms of verbal creativity. The two cohorts completed the same creative writing tasks that were then assessed by a board of five English teachers from the same school who were trained by the authors to assess verbal creativity using a Student Product Assessment Form. An independent samples Student’s t-test was conducted and descriptive statistics of both cohorts for 9 of the assessment form were analyzed. The results showed that the students on the bilingual program outperformed those on the English as foreign language program in terms of verbal creativity. The study offers implications for English language teaching in primary schools with reference to developing creative verbal language skills at early ages.

Update about “minimally verbal” children with autism spectrum disorder

ABSTRACT Objective: To review clinical and neurobiological features of minimally verbal children with autism spectrum disorder. Data source: We carried out a narrative review using the PubMed database. We considered the following search terms combined through the Boolean operator “AND”: “autism spectrum disorder”; “minimally verbal.” Data synthesis: To date, there is no shared definition of minimally verbal children with autism spectrum disorder. The heterogeneity in intellectual functioning and in linguistic abilities among these individuals suggests there is no single mechanism underlying their difficulties in learning to speak. However, the reasons why these children do not speak and the biological markers that can identify them are still unknown. Language impairment in these children can lead to several unfavorable consequences, including behavior problems (such as self-aggression, hetero-aggression, and property destruction), poorer daily living and social skills. Psychiatric comorbidities (including attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, specific phobias, and compulsions) consist in a serious problem related to the lack of verbal language in individuals with autism spectrum disorder. Although in the literature there are very few evidence-based results, several findings suggest that an alternative and augmentative communication intervention, creating an extra-verbal communication channel, may be effective in these individuals. Conclusions: The exact definition, clinical characteristics, associated disorders, etiology, and treatment of minimally verbal subjects with autism spectrum disorder must still be further studied and understood.

MEMBANGUN DAN MEMELIHARA KOMUNIKASI DALAM KONSELING

ABSTRACTCommunication in daily life is a routine activity carried out by social creatures. Success in building good communication is determined by components effectively, empathy, and good manners between fellow educators, education staff, parents, students, and people. This study aims to find out how to create a communication relationship in counseling between BK teachers and students at Muhammadiyah Senior High School 1 of Yogyakarta. The author uses several methods to collect data, such as interviews and observations. The results of this study explain that the communication process in counseling between BK teachers and students includes several stages, namely: The first start by collecting data about students through a questionnaire tool to several problems and a list of problem notes, the second was the teacher provides opportunities for students to convey the problem they face, the third was empathize with students with verbal and non-verbal language, and the fourth was mentoring continuously to optimize students potential (every student who is naughty or problematic must have a positive side). Establishing and maintaining communication requires the following steps, these are relationship building, problem identification and assessment, facilitating counseling change, and evaluation and termination.Keywords: Communication, Counseling. ABSTRAKKomunikasi dalam kehidupan sehari-hari merupakan aktivitas rutin yang dilakukan oleh setiap makhluk sosial. Keberhasilan dalam membangun komunikasi yang baik sangat ditentukan oleh seluruh komponen secara efektif, empati, dan santun, baik antara sesama pendidik, tenaga kependidikan, orang tua, siswa dan masyarakat. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah untuk mengetahui bagaimana konsep membangun hubungan komunikasi dalam konseling antara guru BK dan peserta didik di sekolah SMA Muhammadiyah 1 Yogyakarta. Penulis menggunakan beberapa metode dalam pengumpulan data diantaranya wawancara dan observasi. Hasil penelitian ini menjelaskan bahwa proses komunikasi dalam konseling antara guru BK dan siswa meliputi beberapa tahapan yaitu: 1). Diawali dengan mengumpulkan data-data tentang siswa melalui kuisioner alat ungkap masalah dan daftar catatan masalah, 2). Guru memberikan kesempatan kepada siswa untuk menyampaikan masalah yang dihadapi, 3). Berempati kepada siswa dengan bahasa verbal dan non verbal, 4). Pendampingan secara terus-menerus untuk mengoptimalkan potensi siswa (setiap siswa yang nakal atau bermasalah pasti ada sisi positifnya). Membangun dan memelihara komunikasi diperlukan langkah-langkah sebagai berikut: membangun hubungan, identifikasi dan penilaian masalah, memfasilitasi perubahan konseling, serta evaluasi dan terminasi.Kata Kunci: Komunikasi, Konseling.

Time in Music and Philosophy

The kind of sense music makes, is bound up with how forms of meaning, including in verbal language, are connected to time. Traditional cyclical, epic, and goal-oriented senses of time all play a role in modern musical forms, even though the mythical, religious, and metaphysical content of these forms is hollowed out by scientific advances. The chapter considers aspects of the work of Descartes, Rousseau, Kant, Schelling, Friedrich Schlegel, Dewey, Hegel, Merleau-Ponty, Bergson, Nietzsche, and Heidegger, focusing particularly on the relations between self-consciousness, time, and rhythm, and on how these contribute to the constitution of meaning. The chapter argues that it may make more sense for philosophy to attend to what music reveals about time which can only be grasped by active participation in music, than to seek a comprehensive explanatory account of music and time.

Adaptive Language Processing Unit for Malaysian Sign Language Synthesizer

Language Processing Unit (LPU) is a system built to process text-based data to comply with the rules of sign language grammar. This system was developed as an important part of the sign language synthesizer system. Sign language (SL) uses different grammatical rules from the spoken/verbal language, which only involves the important words that Hearing/Impaired Speech people can understand. Therefore, it needs word classification by LPU to determine grammatically processed sentences for the sign language synthesizer. However, the existing language processing unit in SL synthesizers suffers time lagging and complexity problems, resulting in high processing time. The two features, i.e., the computational time and success rate, become trade-offs which means the processing time becomes longer to achieve a higher success rate. This paper proposes an adaptive Language Processing Unit (LPU) that allows processing the words from spoken words to Malaysian SL grammatical rule that results in relatively fast processing time and a good success rate. It involves n-grams, NLP, and Hidden Markov Models (HMM)/Bayesian Networks as the classifier to process the text-based input. As a result, the proposed LPU system has successfully provided an efficient (fast) processing time and a good success rate compared to LPU with other edit distances (Mahalanobis, Levensthein, and Soundex). The system has been tested on 130 text-input sentences with several words ranging from 3 to 10 words. Results showed that the proposed LPU could achieve around 1.497ms processing time with an average success rate of 84.23% for a maximum of ten-word sentences.

A Study of Communicative Strategies of Thai and Filipino Teachers of English

There are many non-native English language teachers communicating with each other on a daily basis in English. The communicative strategies of non-native English language teachers can be easily identified. This study investigated the communicative strategies used by Thai and Filipino teachers. This research focused on the teacher’s interaction, the framework of communicative strategies of ASEAN English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) speaker, and the lack of studies in communicative strategies. In addition, the study aimed to investigate the significant relationship and communicative strategies between intercultural teaching personnel. The population sample consisted of Thai and Filipinos teachers who provide classroom instruction in English. The research tools used to collect data included a questionnaire, observations during two pair speaking tasks, and a Jigsaw task. A stimulated recall interview was performed after the tasks. All conversations and interactions were recorded and then transcribed. The results revealed that as listeners, “Listen to the message” was ranked the highest among the communicative strategies used by both the Thai and Filipino teachers. “Non-verbal language” was ranked the highest for the Thai teachers; while, “Persuasion” was most frequently used by the Filipino teachers. A Chi-square test showed that there was a statistically significant relationship between communicative strategies used by the Thai and Filipino teachers. Based on the findings of the study, communicative strategies identified in this study should be incorporated into English curriculums and English language teaching in Thailand. Educators, teachers, and non-native English learners should adopt these communicative strategies to promote mutual understandings in the ELF context.

The concept of “Linguistic structure” as the basis of the Methodic for analyzing Vocal Composition

Relevance of the study. In the art vocal music of the second half of the 20 th — early 21st centuries the approaches to the selection of verbal texts are changing, they become the fundamental principle of musical works. The variety of verbal lines gives rise to a variety of composer’s work with them. Composers offer different, including previously unused, ways of working with a verbal text. In this regard, it is necessary to find new methods for the analysis of modern compositions, because traditional methods are no longer suitable for such material. The purpose of the study. The using of the concept of linguistic structure for the analysis of modern vocal scores and its approbation on the example of “Choven” (“Boat”) for three voices a cappella by Alla Zagaykevych is proposed. Methods. The article is based on general scientific and especially scientific methods. Among general scientific methods descriptive, comparative, systemic ones are applied. Among special scientific methods structural and functional ones are used. The results and conclusions. The conception of “language structure” was developed in structural linguistics and is now common in linguistics. It is based on the consideration of verbal language as a holistic system, which is divided into four tiers: phonological, morphological, lexicalsemantic and syntactic. Each tier has a main element, which is the smallest component in its layer. The composer, choosing a specific verbal text, works with it, applying changes at different language levels, which leads to individualization in the interpretation and sound embodiment of the verbal source. Based on the concept of language structure, a method of analysis of a modern vocal work is proposed, which in the article finds approbation on the example by Alla Zagaykevycs work “Choven” [“Boat”] on the text by Mykola Vorobyov’s poetry. It is proved that the composer works only on three language levels: phonological, morphological and lexical-semantic. It was found that when the composer is working at the phonological level it is important to highlight a separate phoneme, presenting its sound color. At the morphological level, the key is the morpheme, which becomes the main expression of the image. If M. Vorobyov works only at the lexical-semantic level, then A. Zagaykevych develops two other levels (phonological and morphological), based on the fact that the lexeme is a combination of smaller quantities. To identify the core of the lexeme, the composer breaks it down into smaller details: from the most important lexeme “choven” the phoneme “ch” stands out, which becomes the core of the whole composition.

Showing Legitimacy: The Strategic Employment of Visuals in the Legitimation of New Organizations

Entrepreneurs commonly engage in discursive activities to pursue the legitimacy of their new organizations. Previous studies on this pursuit have essentially been focused on verbal language and there is limited understanding of how other communication modes, such as the visual, offer specific potentials for influencing legitimation audiences. With the contemporary pervasiveness of digital documents and online environments that often employ the visual mode, this gap has become more relevant. To address it, this study is guided by the following research question: how do entrepreneurs use the visual mode of communication to legitimize their new ventures? Building on the case of a new organization, this study shows that specific features of the visual mode of communication are especially well suited to sustaining legitimation in particular ways. While previous research has mostly remained on a conceptual level, this study empirically advances the understanding of visual discursive legitimation.

Difficulties in semantically congruent translation of verbally and symbolically represented algebraic statements

This paper describes the difficulties faced by a group of middle school students (13- to 15-year-olds) attempting to translate algebraic statements written in verbal language into symbolic language and vice versa. The data used were drawn from their replies to a written quiz and semi-structured interviews. In the former, students were confronted with a series of algebraic statements and asked to choose the sole translation, of four proposed for each, that was semantically congruent with the original. The results show that most of the errors detected were due to arithmetic issues, especially around the distinction between product and exponent or sum and product in connection with the notions of perimeter and area. As a rule, the error distribution by type varied depending on the type of task involved.