Hearing Impairment
We divide groups of children with hearing impairment according to the level of hearing loss, into deaf and hard of hearing. One specific group are children with a cochlear implant.
- Children who are hard of hearing – using compensatory aids (amplifying devices), they can perceive spoken speech with varying limitations and control their speech through hearing. In the speech of the hearing impaired with a sensorineural disorder some words may be absent, similarly the endings of words and the rhythm, accent, and melody of speech may be eroded. The perception and auditory differentiation of individual signals (especially sibilance) and words may be disrupted. The child has difficulty understanding the meaning of words and sentences. Their vocabulary is poorer.
- A deaf child cannot hear spoken speech, even with the help of amplifiers. With timely and systematic speech therapy and special pedagogical care, they can learn to use spoken language. The speech of deaf children tends to be harder to understand, dysgrammatical and with unnatural intonation. Deaf people often prefer alternative forms of communication, most often sign language (especially if the child has deaf parents) or sign-language-accompanied speech (in the case of hearing parents) and other forms of nonverbal communication.
Deaf children also include those who have mastered speech in the regular fashion, but have lost their ability to hear due to illness or accident (at about 5 or 6 years of age). The achieved level of speech may gradually deteriorate due to the lack of auditory feedback and control, this depends on the quality of professional intervention, especially speech therapy.
- Children with cochlear implants – usually communicate through speech, their speech is understandable and often appropriately developed. When working with these children it is important to follow the rules for people with a hearing impairment, i.e. to ensure if possible a calm environment in the class and to make eye contact before directly talking to the child. The speaker should not cover their mouth (the child may combine hearing with lip reading). It is also important to check on the functionality of the external part of the cochlear implant, the microphone and sound processor (whether or not the battery still has charge).