Giving Voice To Deaf Children

[Miss-Delectable]

Giving Voice To Deaf Children - Education News Story - KMGH Denver

Each day, more than 30 kids are born with hearing loss in the United States -- making it the most common birth defect. Special education services for these children can top $1 million. Now, a new study tracks how these children can learn to listen, talk and read.

For Khristi Bowman, story time with twins Mollie and Nate is a blessing. The pair were born at the same time, yet Nate knows there’s something different about his sister.

"If we’re twins, we should not be twins because she has ears, but I don’t… medical ears,” Nate said.

Molly, like 12,000 other babies each year, was born with severe hearing loss. At just 2, she got cochlear implant surgery.

“When I take them off, I couldn’t hear, and I can put them back on, and I can hear,” Molly said.

“It was a big decision to make for her, because ultimately that’s what we were doing. We were making it for her and her future, and we didn’t even know if we were doing the right thing,” Khristi Bowman said.

Audiologist Tamala Bradham, from Vanderbilt University, hears that all too often.

"From all the families that I’ve worked with through the years, they’ve always asked, 'What does this mean for my child?'” Bradham said.

Answers may be coming. A new landmark study is following more than 2,000 deaf kids as they learn to communicate. The focus: diagnosing hearing loss early.

A newborn hearing tests costs a hospital less than $50 a baby. However, just 28 states mandate screening of all babies. Fail to catch hearing loss early, and your kid may suffer delays in vocabulary comprehension.

While 30-month-olds who hear learn up to 120 words a month, a 30-month-old deaf child learns one word per month.

For Bradham, it’s personal.

“I’ve grown up with a hearing loss as well, and knowing what my family went through and really not understanding hearing loss, I just really want to make sure that families have information,” Bradham said.

Knowing how youngsters like Molly learn and adapt could be life-changing. She starts mainstream kindergarten this fall.

Research shows kids with hearing loss in even one ear are 10-times more likely to be held back one grade compared to their normal-hearing peers. If screened at birth, infants can be fit with amplification devices at less than 1 month old. Vanderbilt University’s hearing study is taking place in conjunction with 50 other schools in three countries.

 

[deafdyke]

a 30-month-old deaf child learns one word per month.

Is that even with CIs?

 

[CSign]

Is that even with CIs?

Yeah, seems odd. That number really is only accurate if the kids are only relying on their auditory skills. I can't imagine a deaf child who is consistently exposed to sign learning one word per month. That's crazy. That's why families should be signing with their children.

From what I recall, my son learned at least a few new words each day. Perhaps a part of that was that I always made sure to expand on his language at every opportunity.

That article almost paints a bleak picture of deaf kids, with or without the CI.

 

[CSign]

I wonder where they got that statistic from...

 

[messymama]

If screened at birth, infants can be fit with amplification devices at less than 1 month old.

I wonder how in the world is possible to be so sure about residual hearing in a 1 month old baby to give him correct amplification. there are no reliable test to do at that age, how would they set hearing aids for a baby?? How easy it could be to mess up things giving wrong amplification and then say "Oh, the baby has no benefit from aids, let's implant him"?

I ask myself almost everyday if I should get a CI for my son, but I can't imagine how hard it would have been to make such a decision for a small baby. Now I know him and I can look at him and try to figure out what would suit him, but with such a small baby how can you know... I know early diagnosis is important, but I must admit I'm sometimes glad we didn't have that chance. We had all our time to bond and enjoy our family and find out about his deafness by ourselves, and this made a great difference in our ability to accept the whole situation. Hell, life is not only about hearing and talking.

 

[deafdyke]

Messymama, excellent post. It really is too hard to tell how well a kid can hear with hearing aids, and ABR can be faulty. When they have NO help from hearing aids....yes implant them.
But there are still a lot of kids who are ambigious canidates, and it is TOO hard to tell if those kids would benifit from CI. There are kids with profound losses who get benifit from HAs...

 

[Bebonang]

Fail to catch hearing loss early, and your kid may suffer delays in vocabulary comprehension.

(Bold statement) That is a hogwash. So what, I did not learn until I was almost 9 years old when I went into 1st grade in the mainstream elementary school. I never miss anything as I used visual a lot to make the language for myself (without words, of course). I had enjoyed reading books and learning the vocabulary in grade school. For the young child, it is never too late to learn. Everyday is learning. Look at me, I am doing fine with the vocabulary, even I love using the crossword puzzles (simple and easy. )


We had all our time to bond and enjoy our family and find out about his deafness by ourselves, and this made a great difference in our ability to accept the whole situation. Hell, life is not only about hearing and talking.

That is the most important way to have family time and being bond with your child or children with sign language like ASL. Just wait for the right time if you feel the child want to have CI or not. Surgery with CI is not going to solve anything. Every child is different with hearing degrees. Some are successful and others are not when they are trying out hearing aids or CI devices. So that is the way to go by going slow. Why the hurry? It is never too late at all.

 

[GrendelQ]

@Bebonang, early detection can help a hearing family know that they should begin using ASL with their child. Otherwise, they may leave the child without any language, thinking he or she is picking up spoken words/

 

[messymama]

That's true Grendel, but with small kids communication is naturally made of many things... Touch, smiles, facial expressions, small gestures. We all use them and that is the first form of communication with all children, hearing or deaf. Also, not all families are the same. For us, to be told about his deafness at birth would have been like a bomb and we would have had to struggle later, to see our child for who he is, beyond his deafness. Plus, we would probably had been more likely to do what they pressured us so hard to and implant him - which in these country means almost automatically strict AVT: I had to struggle to find someone to teach us sign language. It's still very hard to find someone to make excercise with.
Your story is very unique and your daughter is lucky to be in an ASL environment, but as far as I know, that's not the norm with IC children and you know, I can understans some of thier parents too... After all, if I have to do SL in any case, and will always need accomodations anyway, why bother to do surgery? They do it exactly to avoid all this!!

 

[GrendelQ]

Hi messymama! I think what you are doing is wonderful. I've increasingly been finding that the majority of families I encounter with deaf kids who wear CIs use sign to some degree, primarily as a backstop for when CIs are off or to support learning. What they sadly aren't doing is using ASL as a language. And that's mostly because, as you are finding, it's very hard to find an environment or situation in which families can become fluent enough to learn the lnguage beyond the basics well enough to shift over and use it as a primary language in the home so the child can be surrounded by language the way hearing kids are awash in spoken language.

Finding a way to make that possible for new parents of deaf kids is a goal I'm working towards, although right now my family needs to work towards increasing our own fluency -- I've got to continue to walk the walk if I'm going to talk the talk, as they say. :laugh2

 

[deafdyke]

I've increasingly been finding that the majority of families I encounter with deaf kids who wear CIs use sign to some degree, primarily as a backstop for when CIs are off or to support learning. What they sadly aren't doing is using ASL as a language. And that's mostly because, as you are finding, it's very hard to find an environment or situation in which families can become fluent enough to learn the lnguage beyond the basics well enough to shift over and use it as a primary language in the home so the child can be surrounded by language the way hearing kids are awash in spoken language.

I was on another site, and a parent who had chosen auditory verbal was SHOCKED to see other parents who had chosen auditory verbal/ auditory oral use fluent ASL with their kids.
I think it would be a neat idea for Deaf Schools and Deaf Programs to reach out to CI families.....like " Hey look, your kid can learn it as a helpful second language!" Maybe also have family camps where the family can learn ASL etc.

 

[Hohtopics]

I wonder where they got that statistic from...

I agree. I find that hard to believe myself "regardless of what background" the deaf child may be from or is immersed in. I'd like to think that I certainly learned more than at a "one word at a month" pace. Cause by the time I was 3 years old, I was already placed at a nursery school.

 

[jillio]

Is that even with CIs?

No.

 

[jillio]

Any research coming out of Vanderbilt is going to be interesting. While their ENT clinic, and the Mama Lere Pre-school, and the Bill Wilkerson Speech and Hearing Center all have a decidedly oral bent, Vandy has some of the best researchers around. I'm anxious to see what their study concludes.