They play with the other kids, learn with the other kids, and most importantly, they socialize with the other kids. They do get external supports because, like all kids with hearing loss, spoken language acquisition is more difficult for them, but otherwise they are just like all the other kids. Children don't go to special schools or attend special classes. One of the important tenets of auditory verbal therapy is early introduction in a mainstream environment. It is a lot to ask of parents already fraying from the diagnosis.Įarlier mainstreaming leads to better socialization So now they have to learn sign language and teach it to their child while still doing all the things necessary for a child to learn spoken language. Most parents don't know sign language when they learn their child is deaf. There are speech therapy sessions to attend and mappings for implants and tunings for hearing aids and meetings with teachers. It takes a lot of effort for children with hearing loss to learn spoken language. Learning spoken language only reduces the stress on parents. Well, if spoken language is the goal for 95-99% of all cochlear implant candidate children, why even bother with sign? Parents that choose the cochlear implant are implicitly making the choice of spoken language, not ASL. There are no hard figures on this, but discussions with a number of the leading institutions in the country lands the number of parents choosing cochlear implantation for their eligible child at somewhere between 95-99%. Most parents of children that are candidates to get the cochlear implant choose the cochlear implant There are pretty obvious reasons why this approach would be a valuable management option for children with Usher who are at risk of losing their vision, but here they are in no particular order: Well, if the goal is the acquisition of spoken language, the AV approach concludes, the best way to accomplish this is by focusing solely on the acquisition of that language and no others. If you want to learn to speak French, the best way is to go to France and speak French. The idea is one of total immersion, no different than learning any other language. Unlike Total Communication (see part 1), the AV approach discourages the use of sign language for children with hearing loss for whom the goal is spoken language acquisition. One of the options for support of spoken language development is Auditory Verbal Therapy. Children that use digital hearing aids and cochlear implants that get the right supports can learn to speak and understand spoken language at a level on par with hearing children. While it is not a cure for hearing loss, it certainly can be considered a cure for the acquisition of spoken language. As stated earlier, the technology today allows people with hearing loss access to more sound than at any point in history. This is generally represented by the Auditory Verbal Therapy approach. To sign or not to sign is still the question before us, only this time we'll look at not to sign. In the absence of sound, the brain re-organises itself to receive input from other senses, primarily vision which results in increased use of gestures and other visual cues.To Sign or Not to Sign Part 3: Auditory Verbal Therapy The first three-and-a-half years of life are the most crucial years for development of the brain. Since listening happens through the brain, early implantation and appropriate therapy results in normal development of neural pathways to receive auditory information. AVT targets 5 domains: audition, language, speech, cognition and communication.The parent, therapist, and child engage in play activities that teach the child to use his or her amplified residual hearing to learn auditory-verbal communication like children with normal hearing.AVT is a ‘parent-centered’ approach that encourages the use of naturalistic conversation and the use of spoken language to communicate.AVT maximises the use of the child’s amplified residual hearing.Unless the sense of hearing is emphasized, these children continue to function as deaf and sound is completely meaningless to them.Īuditory-Verbal Therapy is a specialised type of therapy designed to teach a child to use the hearing provided by a hearing device for understanding speech and learning to talk. Once fitted with a hearing device, the child has to be trained to listen. For a child fitted with a hearing device, listening is not automatic, it requires practice. Hearing is when the sound reaches the ear, listening is when it reaches the brain.
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