understanding learners with hearing impairment
Hard of hearing: refers a hearing loss which ranges from mild to severe. People who are hard of hearing usually communicate through spoken language and can benefit from the use of hearing aids and other assistive devices.
Deaf : refers to a profound hearing loss. people who are deaf depend on sign language to communicate. They can not hear at all at a conversational level.
What causes hearing impairment
A range of causes that fall under environmental, genetic and unknown factors can cause hearing impairment. the causes include:
- exposure to loud sound
- heredity
- diseases and ear infections
- foreign bodies in the ear
- malformation of ear parts
- ear drum rapture
- build up of wax in the ear etc
- Pre-mature birth
- Lack of oxygen during birth
- Head trauma
- Unknown
Questions
1. Looking at the mentioned causes which fall under environmental/ genetic and unknown factors?
2. Mention other causes that have not been mentioned.
3. How can these causes be prevented?
4. classify the causes into the stages in which they are likely to occur.
5. Do learners with HI fall under those with SEN/ disabilities?
How can be identify learners with HI in your class?
Learners with SEN/ disabilities generally can be recognized by how they behave, how they appear , how they perform academically and what they usually say. Below are the indicators of learners with HI.
Learners with HI usually:
- ask for repetition of what has been said
- fail to respond to verbal instruction
- Muffle speech and other sounds
- Have difficulty understanding words, especially against background noise or in a crow
- have trouble hearing consonants especially silent ones
- asking others to speak more slowly, clearly and loudly
- Need to turn up the volume of the television or radio
- Withdrawal from conversations
- Avoidance of some social settings
- Have incomplete and bad spelling in class activities that were dictated.
- use signs/ facial expressions and body language to communicate
Think of other signs of hearing impairment ........
What are the effects of hearing impairment on language development?
It is important to note that everything in the school setting is done through language- which can either be written or spoken. Depending on the time at which hearing loss occurred a person with HI faces a lot of challenges in language.
- Sentence structure
- Speaking
- vocabulary
- Socialization
- Academic achievement
Failure to intervene timely on these problems hinders the learner's chance to rich his best potential/ performance academically.
NB: Check the attached document for the expansion of this points.
Question
Explain how each of the points given can be affected by hearing loss/impairment.
Considering the problems noted above, how best can you accommodate learners with HI in your class?
- in cooperate use of sign language interpreters for deaf learners
- learn basic sign language
- use total communication ( use any means of communication that can help learners to learn the content taught in class thus, pictures, sign language, signs, writing etc)
- provide notes in advance for the child to familiarize himself with the language written ( this allows him to look for the meanings of new words)
- Have a visual representation of content e.g. use graphic organizers to highlight important points an connections in content
- observe the learner's preferred learning style and use suitable teaching methods
- avoid talking while facing away from the learner ( when writing on the board, when moving around the classroom, when facing down looking at the book)
- sit the learner in front seats for better lip reading and stand where the learner can easily see your face
- speak naturally and avoid chewing gums as this can be destructive
Think of other strategies........
NB: Practice the following
1. Lesotho Hand Alphabet/ manual representation of A-Z ( practice finger spelling your name and surname, objects, places etc) Remember we use one hand alphabet in Lesotho.
2. Sign language sentence structure vs English sentence structure ( Object Subject Verb vs Subject Verb Object) I live in Maseru = ENG > Me Maseru live (SL)
Write simple English sentences and convert them to simple Sign language sentences