Training communication abilities in Rett Syndrome through reading and writing

The goal of this clinical case study is to investigate the possibility of training communication abilities in people with Rett Syndrome (RS). Usually, girls with RS never exceed the sensorimotor stage of development, but thei nter-individual variability typical of RS may lead us to doubt their revocability of that developmental limit, especially for those girls who are engaged in cognitive rehabilitation.The case study reported here concerns a 21-year-oldgirl with RS who was engagedincognitiverehabilitationtrainingbasedupontheprinciplesofFeuerstein’smodificabilityandmediatedlearningtheory.Thetrainingaimedtoteachherbasicconceptsandenhancereading-writingabilities.Statisticalanalysesshowedthatthegirlreachedadequatereading-writingabilities,proving the validity of the cognitive intervention which allowed her to communicate by composing words with her forefinger on an alphabetic table. Although these results need to be cautiously considered as they derive from a single case study,theyhaveimplicationsforfuturecognitiverehabilitationfordeeplyimpairedclinicalconditionsasinthecaseofRS.