PURPOSE: To establish changes in learning strategies at reading comprehension levels during a speech-language intervention program for deaf individuals who use sign language. METHODS: Five deaf students, with ages between ten and 15 years, whose preferential modality of communication was the Brazilian Sign Language, participated in the study. All subjects were participating in a speech-language intervention program based on the scaffolding technique. The variables were both the performance of individual assessments of reading comprehension level and strategies used for this purpose, before and after the program. RESULTS: At the end of the intervention program, there were more students using elaboration strategies (p=0.197), and less students using monitoring strategies (p=0.197). There was a significant change in the score of the decoding level (p=0.109), and a tendency to literal comprehension (p=0.197), with increasing scores. Significance was found only between the use of elaboration strategy and the two assessment moments (at the beginning and at the end of the program) (p=0.059). CONCLUSION: The intervention program based on scaffolding technique, enabled deaf students who communicate through sign language to use more elaboration strategies and less monitoring strategies. Therefore, there was a tendency to change from decoding level to literal reading comprehension level.
Deafness; Comprehension; Reading; Sign language; Efficiency, organizational
