Hearing Impaired Children

For Parents of Children with Hearing Loss

Do you have a child of any age with a hearing loss?
Have you just found out your child has a hearing loss?
If you have a newborn, have they been screened for hearing loss?

HLAA is here for parents. We have created a Parents Section just for you. The goal is to give you information and resources to help you make informed decisions about your child’s hearing loss. The choices are yours to make for your children, but gather all the information on possible options.

We also have a discussion site where you can post messages or questions. You are not alone, there are many parents like yourself looking for solid information and support.
Go to Parent to Parent: Resources for Parents of Children with Hearing Loss
View the Education pages under the Advocacy section for other useful information.
Teaching Mainstreamed Students with Hearing Loss
Video for Parents, Teachers and Students
HLAA Member Zina Jawadi, a high school senior who has a hearing loss produced a video for teachers and school staff who have students with hearing loss. The video is open captioned.

Children and Hearing Loss

• Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) refers to the process of screening every newborn for hearing loss prior to hospital discharge, whereby infants not passing the screening receive appropriate diagnostic evaluation before three months of age and, when necessary, are enrolled in early intervention programs by six months of age.
• Hearing screening is a test to tell if a child might have hearing loss. Hearing screening is easy and is not painful. In fact, babies are often asleep while being screened. It takes a very short time — usually only a few minutes.
• The earlier a hearing loss is detected in infants the better the outcome for language and speech development.
• In children, hearing loss can be confused with a learning disability when, in fact, the child might not be hearing clearly what the teacher is saying.
• Even a mild hearing loss or a one-sided hearing loss can affect school work. Research has shown that on average, children with mild hearing loss perform poorer than their normally-hearing peers and may need to repeat a grade.
• More than ever, young people are at risk for hearing loss because of repeated exposure to loud sounds from musical instruments, MP3 and iPod players and any personal listening device inserted in the ear. Any sort of sound can cause a permanent hearing loss if it is loud enough and lasts long enough.

Misarticulation

(Tutlana)

Articulation is the process by which sounds are formed when your tongue, jaw, teeth, lips, and palate alter the air stream coming from the vocal folds. Sounds are learned in an orderly sequence. Some sounds, such as "p," "m," and "b," are learned as early as 1 year of age. Other sounds, like "s," "r,' and "l," often are not completely mastered until the early school years. Children should make all the sounds of English by 8 years of age but many children learn these sounds much earlier.
Someone has an articulation problem when he or she produces sounds, syllables or words incorrectly so that listeners do not understand what is being said. An articulation problem sometimes sounds like baby talk because many very young children do mispronounce sounds, syllables, and words. But words that sound cute when mispronounced by young children interfere with the communication of older children or adults.
Misarticulation haveis not any type of physical disorder ,it is a bad habit so its may be recover 100%. But need of proper speech therapy.

Types of sound errors

Most errors fall into one of three categories: omissions, substitutions or distortions. An example of an omission is "at" for "hat" or "oo" for "shoe." An example of a substitution is the use of "w" for "r" which makes "rabbit" sound like "wabbit," or the substitution of "th" for "s" so that "sun" is pronounced "thun." When the sound is said inaccurately, but sounds something like the intended sound, it is called a distortion.

What causes an articulation problem?

Articulation problems may result from a hearing impairment. Children learn their speech sounds by listening to the speech around them. This learning begins very early in life. If children have frequent ear infections during this important listening period and subsequently suffer from glue ear, they may fail to learn some speech sounds.

Articulation problems may also be related to a weakness of the oral muscles.

How can I help a child pronounce words correctly?

• Don't interrupt or correct the child. Don't let anyone tease or mock (including friends or relatives).
• Present a good model. Use the misarticulated word correctly with emphasis. If the child says, "That's a big wabbit," you say "Yes, that is a big rabbit. A big white rabbit. Would you like to have a rabbit?"
• Don't let anyone "translate" for the child, this will encourage them to pronounce more clearly.

A child with an articulation disorder needs speech therapy. Without treatment, a child may struggle with lifelong vocational, learning, emotional and social problems.

Causes of Articulation Disorder

For many children the cause of oral or motor dysfunction articulation disorder comes from from brain damage or neurological dysfunction. For other children, however, there is no clearly identifyable cause.

Symptoms of Articulation Disorder?

• Distortions - An attempt is made at the correct sound but it results in a poor production
• Omissions - Sounds in words and sentences may be completely omitted
• Additions - Extra sounds or syllables are added to the word
• Dysarthria - slow, slurred speech with inaccurate movement of the articulators
• Substitutions - An incorrect (usually easier) sound may be substituted for the correct one

Articulation Treatment

Any child and adult have misarticulation problem (tutlana),he need a proper speech therapy and taught and how to correct use of speech organs for speaking the correct word.
Children may mispronounce sounds until the age of eight years. Parents can facilitate pronunciation of speech sounds by providing many opportunities for the child to hear and say the sound correctly. Since hearing affects sound acquisition, be sure to have your child's hearing screened regularly.

• Use speech that is clear and easy for your child to follow.
• Repeat what your child says, using correct sounds. Never imitate incorrect speech.
• Avoid baby talk that uses sounds incorrectly.
• Make a picture book of interesting pictures containing a misarticulated sound. Have fun perusing the book and talking about the pictures. Be sure to say the words with the target sound frequently. Stress the sound ever so slightly, but keep your production natural.
• Sing songs and recite poems and nursery rhymes that contain the target sounds.
• Select four or five common household words containing the target sound and use them frequently during the day.
• Show your child how to make the sound, especially if it is a visible sound like l, s, ch, j, or th. Use this methodsparingly to avoid frustration.
• Encourage talking. If the child is unintelligible, try to determine the meaning from context. Whenever possible, avoid asking the child to repeat what he or she has just said. This will reduce frustration.
• If your child has many misarticulations, focus on one or two sounds for a few weeks at a time.

Statlering

Stuttering Therapy for Children

Should My Child Attend Speech Therapy?

Deciding whether to take your child to speech therapy can be a difficult decision, however. Many parents are concerned that taking a child to therapy will increase his or her awareness of the stuttering and thus have a negative effect, or are unsure about the best time to start their child in therapy especially when they get conflicting advice about whether to “wait and see” versus take action. Adding to the confusion, research suggests that as many as 70% of all children who start stuttering will outgrow it on their own with no speech therapy. But, research also indicates that if a child has been stuttering longer than one year, the likelihood that he or she will outgrow it without any speech therapy is reduced.
Unfortunately, there are no firm guidelines about the best time to start therapy although most speech-language pathologists will recommend starting therapy within 6-12 months after you have first noticed the stuttering. One thing we do know, though, is that all children can benefit from therapy, although the outcomes are different for different children.
As a result of speech therapy, some children are able to eliminate stuttering completely. Others learn strategies that help them stutter less, while yet other children learn to talk in a way that is easier and less tense even though some stuttering is still noticeable. Most importantly, all children can learn to become more confident in their speaking skills no matter how much stuttering they may still have.
Deciding to take your child to stuttering therapy is an important step in helping your child. Once you have made this decision, getting information about stuttering and stuttering therapy will help you decide:

• The speech-language pathologist who is right for you and your child;
• The amount, length, and cost of treatment;
• Possible goals for speech therapy; and,
• The amount of success to be expected.

Choosing a Speech-Language Pathologist

How do you find a speech-language pathologist (SLP) who is right for you and your child? First, learn as much as you can about stuttering so you will know whether the SLP you choose is also knowledgable about childhood stuttering. You may even want to read more about stuttering therapy. This website offers information about stuttering and stuttering therapy, as do many of the products we offer to families.
Also, use a referral source. Our list of therapists has names of people who specialize in treating stuttering. If one is not located near you, contact a local university, hospital, or speech and hearing clinic. Universities that have training programs in speech pathology often have a speech clinic that will provide therapy for stuttering.
Your local school district is required by federal law (IDEA) to offer speech therapy to children who are eligible. Contact your local school district’s special education department to find out more about having your child screened and evaluated for stuttering.
Once you’ve contacted a speech pathologist, interview them. There are many important questions you will want to ask, but a few in particular are very important.

1. How comfortable are you with evaluating and treating stuttering? This is important because some speech pathologists are not comfortable working with stuttering.
2. How many children who stutter have you worked with? This will help you determine whether the speech pathologist has the kind of experience you need.
3. What do you think the primary goals of stuttering therapy should be for a child? This will help you decide whether the speech pathologist’s ideas about goals match your own.
4. What approaches do you use in speech therapy? How often is therapy scheduled? It’s important that the therapy be scheduled at a time that will work well for you, your child, and the SLP. Sometimes the therapy schedule the speech pathologist offers will not work for you because of your job, your child’s naptime, or other family commitments. Getting to therapy should not be extremely inconvenient or stressful.
5. What do you believe the parents’ role should be in speech therapy? For most children, the degree of success they will experience in therapy is directly related to the amount of support they receive from their families in making necessary changes. Finding a speech-language pathologist who believes that you have a crucial role in therapy and is willing to help you learn how to best help your child is an important part of this process.

Expectations for Success

As you work with the speech pathologist to meet your child’s goals, you will also set your criteria for success. Becoming an effective communicator and living successfully with stuttering should be among the most important of these criteria.

Goals for Therapy

Stuttering therapy for children usually means learning to talk in an easier manner, and to build positive emotions, and attitudes about talking. As a result, length and type of therapy can vary greatly depending on your child’s needs. A list of sample therapy goals for children includes:

• Reducing the frequency of stuttering;
• Decreasing the tension and struggle of stuttering moments;
• Working to decrease word or situation avoidances;
• Learning more about stuttering; and,
• Using effective communication skills such as eye contact or phrasing.

Working together with a speech pathologist who is knowledgeable about stuttering will help your child learn to talk successfully and well.

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