The Lorax

      I read this story to a student this morning. She loves Dr. Suess and she keeps requesting that I bring my book back to her the next time I see her. Who am I to say, "no?" Today's story got me thinking...We all seem to take for granted what we presently have only to really treasure it until we don't have it anymore. Hard as it may be to believe, hearing loss is one of those things. I use to hate my hearing loss. I don't anymore. In fact, I embrace my hearing loss and treasure it now. You can't go through life taking your hearing loss for granted. It makes you unique, but doesn't define you. It gives you opportunities hearing people can't have. For example, you can shine at life despite a hearing loss. You can model success to hearing people. You can tell them how to survive in a hearing world, and your acts will back your words up! The student I read to is only in Kindergarten, so I don't expect her to understand any of what I just typed. One day, she will, and I'll be sure to tell her to treasure her hearing loss and not take it for granted.

Utterance Discrimination Auditory Skill

This name sounds terrible, but it's all I could think of. This idea came to me this weekend while playing with my daughter. She's in her babbling stage and she likes to say ba-ba-ba repeatedly, with some "da da" mixed in. :)

Today I had a student cover his left ear so I could have him work on his right ear, and vice-versa. He had to face away from me and listen to me say ba-ba and count up the number of times he heard me say it. I gave him five trials in each ear. He did okay, but he can always do better. In the future, I'll bring my headphones so I can give him some white noise in the ear I don't want to test in order to get some masking work in.

McElligot's Pool

I read McElligot's Pool to one of my students this morning. Since I've been reading Dr. Suess a lot since last week (his birthday was 3/2). Today's story had a good message. If you haven't read it, take the time to do so. It's a quick and easy read with a good moral...

+++Don't let someone tell you something can't be done!!+++

The Life of Job

You may be familiar with Job's life as mentioned in the Bible thru the book of Job. I hope you are; if you aren't, I hope you will take the time to read it and meditate on the lessons found in Job. God let Satan take everything away from Job except for his life and test his faith. Job never lost his faith in God. As a result, he was blessed in return with more than he had to begin with.

Let me make things clear-I am not faithful to God because He blesses me. I could be living the worst imaginable life possible and I am confident that I will not lose my trust in God. I love Him because He first loved me. Job had two choices. He could lose his faith or keep it. Of course, he chose to keep his faith. I want make a comparison between us folks with hearing loss and Job. Being deaf is, in a sense, being robbed of life since so much of our communication is oral. Deaf Culture has sign language, but what about those of us who are deaf and oral?

There are one of two choices that can be made here by a person with hearing loss.

1) don't accept the hearing loss
2) accept the hearing loss and adapt

I lived a long stage of my life making choice number 1. It wasn't until I made the 2nd choice I began to truly live my life. When did I convert from 1 to 2?? It happened when I truly surrendered my life to God at the age of 26. I'll be 33 years old soon, and the last 6 years of my life have been better than the first 26 combined.

I chose to accept my hearing loss and put my faith in God. You can, too.

Auditory Activity with a Basketball

If you ever need an activity to do with a male student targeting his auditory skills, you can use a basketball. How? Simple-take the basketball and dribble it X number of times while your student is facing away from you. Have him count the number of dribbles he heard. You can also bounce in a pattern (bounce twice, pause, bounce twice, etc) and have him tell you the pattern.

Clarity

I did some work today with one of the audiologists on staff at Clarity Upstate today, and I have to say I was thoroughly impressed with their assistance. They were prompt in responsiveness and answered all questions I had, in detail. If you are in the market for audiology services, check them out! Click here to visit them online.

Relationship of Hearing Loss to Listening and Learning Needs

Click here to access an online quick-reference chart listing the hearing losses and possible educational impacts on each.