Hearing and Kids

For children with hearing loss to succeed in classroom they need a variety of skills. And learning those skills needs to start when hearing loss is identified – hopefully within the first few weeks. So lets talk about what we think needs to be learned.   Detection and Discrimination In order for children to succeed in the classroom they need

What do Children Need to Hear in the Classroom? The majority of what children learn, they learn using audition. We learn by overhearing conversation around us. Children need to hear the teacher, but they also have to hear other children’s comments and questions. They need to be able to hear classroom discussion in order to participate. They need to hear

More than 80% of kids with hearing loss are educated in mainstream settings. For them to succeed, they need to be able to participate in every aspect of school activities. THEY NEED TO HEAR!!!! Newborn hearing screening has resulted in really early identification. Kids with hearing loss are identified within weeks of birth. But we all know that early identification

The Spoken Language vs ASL Debate is Back post, originally published 6/14/2016,  got lots of discussion. It just seems to go on and on. Go back and read it – or not. Maybe we don’t need to think about this during the holiday season. Not a good time to fight with each other. Let’s have a New Year’s Resolution directed

The New York Times had an article on December 6, 2016 about volume-limiting earphones for children.  They reported that half of children’s earphones tested did not meet the restricted volume to the promised limit and made some recommendations. Noise induced hearing loss is not a laughing matter. And, the more kids are exposed to loud noise or music, the more

The New York Times had an article on December 6, 2016 about volume limiting earphones for children (https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/health/headphones-hearing-loss-kids.html?_r=0). They reported that half of children’s earphones tested did not meet the restricted volume to the promised limit.   Noise induced hearing loss is not a laughing matter. And, the more kids are exposed to loud noise or music, the more their

The way tests are scored is what determines whether kids are eligible for services from school districts. So I think we really need to think about how tests are scored. When tests are standardized, results are considered “within normal limits” or “average” if they are within two standard deviations from the mean.   What exactly does this mean? 68% of

I do a lot of school visits in which I see how teachers are working with children with hearing loss in their classrooms. One of the major things I get to look at is how they are using the remote microphones. Today I attended a book group meeting in which there was someone with a hearing loss who used a

Bev Biderman wrote “Wired for Sound” about her experience receiving a cochlear implant. It was first published in 1998 and updated in 2016. She is not the only person who wrote about the experience of receiving a cochlear implant but her book has something that is quite unusual. Last week, her book was performed as an opera in Lisbon, Portugal

Last week I had the opportunity to evaluate a child who was having problems hearing. His mother reported the following history. John (not his real name), failed newborn hearing screening. Follow up testing indicated a mild hearing loss with middle ear fluid. He was retested several times by both the audiologist and the otolaryngologist who both told the parents that