CI and interpreting

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dutchie88

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Hello everyone,

Before I start I will first introduce myself: My name is Marrit and I'm a first year student at the Hogeschool Utrecht, The Netherlands, where I study to become a sign language interpreter.

For an assignment I’m trying to find out what kind of impact the rising number of CI users will have on sign language interpreters.

First I tried to find out if the using of interpreters will lessen as more people will have a CI.
But now I think it’s much more interesting to find out if interpreting itself should be different for people with a CI. It’s very hard to find information about this subject so that’s why I hope the people of this board will be able to help.

I have a few questions that I hope you will answer:

-Since you have a CI, do you still use interpreters?
-In what situations do or don’t you like to use an interpreter?
-Do you, now that you have a CI, have different needs when it comes to interpreting? Do you want interpreters to interpret for you in a different way? And if so, how?

Parents of children with a CI are more than welcome to answer above questions for their children as well.
I think it’s very interesting to know if these children have different needs when it comes to interpreting and what aspects interpreters should pay extra attention to.
For example: do you prefer Manually Coded English for your children? Or ASL?

If there is anything else you would like to say regarding this subject or if you have stories or experiences you would like to share then please do.
I think this is such an interesting subject and I’m trying to collect as much information as I can.

Thank you very much for your time!
 
I had my CI for nearly 2 years and i still need my Electronic notetaker. I have been profoundly deaf since birth.

Since my CI, my lipreading may have improved alot, but I still need assistance while I am in class.

My electronic notetaker enables that I can carry on lipreading the tutor without having to look down to write my notes and missing anything.

I dislike that she had to sit infront of me?!? I keep telling her to sit next to me but the course tutor complains that there is no room in the class for her to sit next to me, I will point out it's my rights for her to sit next to me... also at the same time I want to be able to lipread the tutor without having to move my head to see round my notetaker's head!

This method is similar (it was pen and paper then) as I had used 12 years ago when I had Hearing Aids. So no change really.

If there is test that needs to be spoken, my Eletronic notetaker uses BSL with oral approach to say something, although, I do prefer SSE or just normal spoken lang but I understood her ok and isn't too bothered by it as my english isn't affected by it.
 
Since my CI, my lipreading may have improved alot, but I still need assistance while I am in class.
Click to expand...
That is a very good point! Just b/c a CI improves one on one speech perception (in best conditions) it DOES NOT mean that it will be very helpful in ALL conditons. People with CIs are still hoh, and still deal with the disadvantages of being hoh.
 
I hav ci for 17 yrs. I used to hear a lot of sound. But in class. I would use intpreter but I didn't really need it. Because I understood speech and language. So I don't really relyied on lipreading very much if I do for examples batteries died or loose parts.
 
Yes, if I recall off the top of my head, a significent number of "oral" kids use 'terps. As a matter of fact, it's not that unusal at AG Bell conferences to see a lot of 'terps!
 
Overthepond,

One question.... Are you able to hear or understand words without lip reading?



"I had my CI for nearly 2 years and i still need my Electronic notetaker. I have been profoundly deaf since birth.

Since my CI, my lipreading may have improved alot, but I still need assistance while I am in class."
 
mrfunzofunzo,

I was born profoundly deaf, implanted at 30 yo. It took me ages to be able to hear and understand the words. My implant centre said it would take 10,000's of hours to learn (as 5 year old hearing child would have learnt by listening) so I was in for long and hard slog! at first i found it very funstrating. I probably had 20 hours of listening practice since sept 2009.

Let me explain, The centre and I are working together at the moment because they are very interested to see how a profound deaf person since birth to learn the sounds that have not been heard for 30 years (especially high freq) So far they have been doing listening practices with me, trying to understand what i can hear and what my brain responses, it had been very interesting learning what happening with my ears/brain... also found little few problems, for example I have no 14 electrode switched off.... i cannot tell the difference of S and SH words.... and recently i was having problems telling the difference between e and u they worked out and found out that my HA in my umimplanted ear no longer benefits, since then they had given me new aid and cranked it up to 30 db at 250hz only (where e, u and other low freq sounds is).
Over the last few months I have had sessions with the centre at first i couldn't tell the difference with pit, put etc and had the habit of guessing so they have very nearly broken my habit, now days I can listen to sentences (without lipreading) completely ransom but on paper there is 6 words (nothing in the sentences) that I had to carefully listen for context of the sentences/question. Like, The 6 words were Sunshine, Rainbow, snow, Frost, Stick, Potato. The Speech therapist would say "wasn't it very cold and Icy this morning" because i heard Ice and cold so thought frost would be the answer, "your dog, Boris loves to play with this" i heard Boris very easily.... answer is stick! But this is in closed room and with a person who i have been practicing for months, so it's not in the real world.


At the moment i would say i won't be confidently pick up a phone and call some ransom person. As far i am still struggling to understand my mum (she does rabbits on! bless her) but it's improving every time (we call once a week as she lives in austria which is very expensive)

It takes time, sweat, tears to reach this!, I am pretty pleased with myself. My friend who had her Implant for 3 years (coming up 4) she says she's still learning everyday.
 
I hope you don't mind some input from a hearing person who is an interpreter.

Over the years, I have interpreted for several deaf consumers who have CI's. They ranged in age from middle schoolers to middle aged. Most were college students in their 20's. So yes, some people with CI's do use interpreters.

Most of the interpreting situations were in schools, church, or company meetings. From what the deaf consumers told me, in general, they needed terps for those kinds of settings but could usually manage OK in one-on-one conversations in quiet rooms without terps. A few of them could use regular cell phones but preferred to watch TV with captions on.

In the interpreted situations, most of them preferred to do their own voicing but a few did not.
 
U have said it Reba... thank you.

I may be able to understand quite alot but in room of lots of people and they are firing questions/answers, i have no idea who was it and they do talk over other people too... hence i need notetaker also since i rely on lipreading strongly, i can't lipread and take notes at same time, my notetaker eases the pressure off me so I can see, listen and lipread what the tutor is saying.
 
I have had my cochlear implant for almost 4 years and I still will need a sign language interpreter along with CART when I start college again this fall. I have used 'terps in the past but not CART because I never knew CART was available. Now that I know it is available I will be requesting both a 'terp and CART. I don't want a notetaker because most college students suck at taking proper notes and their handwriting are awful, and they leave out a LOT of really crucial information! Annoyed me to no end at my old university! I failed several classes because of this. Not enough information to study for tests and pop quizzes. And sometimes they don't give you their copy of the notes until the LAST DAY before the test! Then I end up having to cram! Not acceptable!
 
overthepond said:
mrfunzofunzo,

I was born profoundly deaf, implanted at 30 yo. It took me ages to be able to hear and understand the words. My implant centre said it would take 10,000's of hours to learn (as 5 year old hearing child would have learnt by listening) so I was in for long and hard slog! at first i found it very funstrating. I probably had 20 hours of listening practice since sept 2009.

Let me explain, The centre and I are working together at the moment because they are very interested to see how a profound deaf person since birth to learn the sounds that have not been heard for 30 years (especially high freq) So far they have been doing listening practices with me, trying to understand what i can hear and what my brain responses, it had been very interesting learning what happening with my ears/brain... also found little few problems, for example I have no 14 electrode switched off.... i cannot tell the difference of S and SH words.... and recently i was having problems telling the difference between e and u they worked out and found out that my HA in my umimplanted ear no longer benefits, since then they had given me new aid and cranked it up to 30 db at 250hz only (where e, u and other low freq sounds is).
Over the last few months I have had sessions with the centre at first i couldn't tell the difference with pit, put etc and had the habit of guessing so they have very nearly broken my habit, now days I can listen to sentences (without lipreading) completely ransom but on paper there is 6 words (nothing in the sentences) that I had to carefully listen for context of the sentences/question. Like, The 6 words were Sunshine, Rainbow, snow, Frost, Stick, Potato. The Speech therapist would say "wasn't it very cold and Icy this morning" because i heard Ice and cold so thought frost would be the answer, "your dog, Boris loves to play with this" i heard Boris very easily.... answer is stick! But this is in closed room and with a person who i have been practicing for months, so it's not in the real world.


At the moment i would say i won't be confidently pick up a phone and call some ransom person. As far i am still struggling to understand my mum (she does rabbits on! bless her) but it's improving every time (we call once a week as she lives in austria which is very expensive)

It takes time, sweat, tears to reach this!, I am pretty pleased with myself. My friend who had her Implant for 3 years (coming up 4) she says she's still learning everyday.
Click to expand...

Wow, interesting!
 
Thank you all very much for your replies! And Reba, input from interpreters is also very much appreciated!

So it seems that interpreters are most needed at places where it can be a bit crowded. And I think the age of which the person is implanted can matter too?
 
And I think the age of which the person is implanted can matter too?
Click to expand...
Nope. Not in this instance. Even a lot of people who were implanted early still may need 'terps for group situtions.
 
deafdyke said:
Nope. Not in this instance. Even a lot of people who were implanted early still may need 'terps for group situtions.
Click to expand...
It's true that even people who were implanted at an early age may still want some communication assistance. However, if they didn't grow up using sign language, a terp might not be the solution. There is still CART and other assistive techniques and strategies that might work though.
 
Thanks, I'm learning a lot here!

But do you think interpreting for people who were implanted early is different from interpreting for people who were implanted later in life?
For example: are they more likely to use Manually Coded English?
 
-Since you have a CI, do you still use interpreters?
I am just now able to hear enough with the CI for it to help me with lipreading. So yes, I still use interpreters. (15 months post-activation)

-In what situations do or don’t you like to use an interpreter?
one on one, small group if they are sensitive to my needs.

-Do you, now that you have a CI, have different needs when it comes to interpreting? Do you want interpreters to interpret for you in a different way? And if so, how?
That's usually on me to tell the terp what I want different. NOw that I am progressing well, I have been positioning the terp near the speaker so I can lip-read the speaker and look at the terp if I miss words.

Late-deafened CI folks who did not have to do extensive training to train their brain fare better and tend not to need terp services as much as others who are auditory prelingual.
 
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