Communication Considerations for Children With Hearing Loss

When a child fails a hearing screening and follow-up testing reveals a hearing loss, parents often experience a roller coaster of emotions. During this time, parents might get overwhelmed by making decisions that will affect the rest of their child’s life. However, as professionals, we must convey the importance of early intervention on future outcomes. Early exposure to language, in any form, lays the foundation for future communication skills. We also must come to the table with unbiased information. Allow parents to review all options and choose a path to communication they feel best fits their child and family. As speech-language and hearing professionals, we must put aside our own biases and assist these families on their journey to communication, helping them to understand that this is a marathon, not a sprint. As an educational audiologist, I work with children who communicate and are educated using a in a variety of different methodologies I see, first hand, how these decisions affect them in terms of communication, as well as academically and socially. For the purpose of this blog, I concentrate on four communication options, as identified by AG Bell’s Listening and Spoken Language Knowledge Center. I use the term “outcomes” because I think parents should ask themselves: “What do I want for my child? How do I want them to learn and communicate with others? What is my ultimate goal for them?” Then they should pick a methodology to support those outcomes...
Source: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) Press Releases - Category: Speech Therapy Authors: Tags: Audiology Early Intervention Hearing Assistive Technology hearing loss Language Disorders Schools Speech Disorders Source Type: blogs