The At The Rhode Island Parent Information Network

I have been a part of Cora Barclay Centre since I was 4 years old, they have given me an opportunity to able to speak just like everybody else and I wouldn’t thanks enough for them to continue teaching me to speak and hear. Web of Hearing Impaired Student's Peer Alliance (WHISPA) is a peer group of the young adult who are hearing impairment that comes together from Adelaide’s surroundings such as Northern, Southern, Eastern and Western Adelaide. They come together each fortnight at Cora Barclay Centre to create a unique friendship and good opportunities for those who are hearing impairment to be themselves. Also to able to share their experience to another about their life with hearing impaired. Since being with WHISPA for a couple years, I

(n.d.). Part one: the deaf community and cochlear implants my child can have more choices: reflections of deaf mothers on cochlear implants for their children. Cochlear Implants: Evolving Perspectives. Retrieved February 09, 2018, from http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/excerpts/CIEP.html

For my American Sign Language class I needed to attend some type of Deaf event. The event I chose was the showing of Love is Never Silent on October 22nd from 6-8pm in Wiley Hall at the University of Minnesota. Love is Never Silent is a very touching and powerful television movie from 1985. This movie can help the hearing world get a look at what it is like to have family members that are Deaf. This movie was also probably an inspiration for Deaf people by how relatable it could be to their life. The movie follows Margaret, a child of Deaf parents, through childhood until she is a grown adult. During the stages of Margaret’s life depicted through the movie I learned new information about Deaf culture and was able to make

Deaf Like Me is a story compiled together by Thomas and James Spradley. It is a compelling story about two hearing+ parents struggling to cope with their daughters overwhelming deafness. This powerful story expresses with simplicity the love, hope, and anxieties of all hearing parents of deaf children. In the epilogue, Lynn Spradley, herself, now a teenager thinks back about different times in her life growing up deaf. She reflects upon her education, her struggle to communicate, and the discovery that she was the inspiration and the main focus of her father's and uncle's book collaboration. Deaf Like Me is a

Mark Drolsbaugh presentation titled “Madness in the Mainstream” encompassed Deaf education and challenges Deaf children face with mainstream education. Drolsbaugh was born hearing and as he grew up, he had progressive hearing loss and became Deaf by college. Luckily for him, he was born into a Deaf family. Drolsbaugh went on to Graduate from Gallaudet and wrote for different deaf newspapers and publications and became a school counselor. He had written four books by 2014 pertaining to the Deaf community. Madness in the Mainstream was actually his fourth book and was the basis to this presentation.

Two centuries ago, the Deaf community arose in American society as a linguistic minority. Members of this community share a particular human condition, hearing impairment. However, the use of American Sign Language, as their main means of communicating, and attendance to a residential school for people with deafness also determine their entry to this micro-culture. Despite the fact that Deaf activists argue that their community is essentially an ethnic group, Deaf culture is certainly different from any other cultures in the United States. Deaf-Americans cannot trace their ancestry back to a specific country, nor do Deaf neighborhoods exist predominantly throughout the nation. Additionally, more than ninety percent of deaf persons are born

deaf: working for the rights of all deaf people in this country, including education of deaf children.

First, this book allowed me to see the negative way in which deaf people were perceived. This book is not old by any means, and I was taken aback by the way deaf children were perceived by not only others in the community, but often times by their own parents as well. The term

Have you ever felt like there was nothing that you can do for your child? In this book, Deaf Like Me, by Thomas S. Spradley and James P. Spradley, I can see the journey that Lynn’s parents took to get her help. (Spradley & Spradley, 1978). This book was an excellent read. I really liked the way that they described the ways they tried to help Lynn to understand the world around her. The book, is a great asset for any family that might be unexpectedly put into a situation that they know nothing about such as a deaf child.

Mark Drolsbaugh’s Deaf Again book gives a detailed account of his experience with becoming deaf in both a hearing and deaf world. It includes the awkwardness and un-comfortability he felt in hearing environments, within is personal family dynamic and in deaf safe havens where he learned to adjust, and grow for the betterment of him learning ASL and in general, becoming emerged within Deaf culture. Drolsbaugh starts the book off by introducing how life for deaf people, even when giving birth, can be a struggle (due to society not being well informed on how to effectively communicate and treat Deaf individuals). Drolsbaugh’s mother, Sherry, wasn’t properly given epidural while giving birth to him, and as she made noises to best express that something was wrong, the nurse brushed it off. Once Mark was born, and Sherry got up the needle wasn’t in her back but on the bed. Looking at how communication issues can lead to negative results, throughout the rest of the book Drolsbaugh sheds light on this phenomenon, specifically focusing on the educational environment and the interactions between and among hearing and deaf communities.

American Annals of the Deaf is an educational journal that is committed to providing educational experiences of high quality as well as related services for the deaf. This journal has been around for over 150 years, and over time they have been dedicated to making sure that children and adults who are deaf or hard of hearing are receiving quality assistance for their disability (NEED CITATION). In July 1996, they published a scholarly article in response to a survey Catherine Gillespie and Sandra Twardosz conducted about the literacy environment and different practices that children are receiving in a residential school for the deaf.

Getting parents involved is essential to supporting the development of a child with hearing loss. Counselling parents on the type and degree of hearing loss their child has and the effects of hearing loss is important. It is important to not focus solely on what the child cannot hear but also what the child can hear. Parents will need a lot of support in the beginning and it is my job as an audiologist to provide information and my professional advice. The goal is to help parents make the choices that are right for them and create positive outcomes for the child. It is necessary for parents to understand the benefit of amplification or intervention services so that everyone involved is working towards a common goal. Parents should also be knowledgeable of the services available to them and be prepared to advocate for their child. The school system provides supports for children with hearing loss and parents need to know how to obtain the services for their child. The audiologist can act as a resource for parents at any point as the child develops there will be new challenges. There is a partnership between the parent and the audiologist based on trust and a mutual understanding to provide the best care for the

The Deaf Community in America: History in the Making by Melvia M. Nomeland and Ronald E. Nomeland is a book written to describe the changes the Deaf community, with a capital “D”, has encountered throughout time. The authors mention, “By using the capital ‘D’ to refer to a community of people who share a language and culture and the lower case ‘d’ to refer to the audiological condition of hearing loss” (Nomeland 3). In this book we are taken through a time line on how the Deaf community’s life changed socially and educationally allowing them to live normally.

In the same way that no two individuals are alike, nor are any two families with deaf or hard of hearing members. Due to the various ways that hearing loss can occur, the occurrence of hearing loss in any one family can vary. There are families with deaf parents and hearing children. There are families with deaf parents and deaf children. There are families who have never encountered a deaf or hearing impaired person that suddenly have a child who is deaf or hard of hearing. Hearing impairment affects different families in different ways. Many believe that families where both parents and the children are deaf or hard of hearing have an advantage, because the parents are already a part of the deaf culture and thus their children are born into the community. Meanwhile, hearing parents who birth a deaf or hearing impaired child have to adjust to a new way of relating to and communicating with not only their child, but also with those involved in the rearing of that child. Fortunately for these parents, organizations like the Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing exist to provide these families with resources, funds, and education to help them tread on unfamiliar territory. These kinds of organizations connect all families who have members with the disability, and no matter the family dynamic, there are resources for them to take advantage of, including legal aid. As seen in the short clip from the Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, early childhood, around the time of

“Mother Father Deaf: Living Between Sound and Silence” by Paul Preston, portrays interviews with over 150 individuals, who are all hearing children of deaf parents. Being that Preston is a child of deaf parents, himself, it made it a lot easier for the informants to fully open up to him. He understands where they are coming from and is relatable for them. One of their biggest frustrations is having to explain deafness- in terms of their parents, as well as themselves, to people who don’t understand the culture. One interviewee even mentioned, “I wasn’t going to do the interview because I always get asked so many dumb questions. It’s a lot better knowing that you understand, that I don’t have to explain everything” (Preston, 46). The common bond between Preston and them helped gained a sense of trust between each other.