We found a summer school for Miss Kat!!! The State School for the Deaf does not have a summer program, and they don't believe that Miss Kat is eligible for ESY (I have issues with that assessment, but that is a different post). So, I have been searching high and low for a program for Miss Kat. Since we are going to the oral class in the fall we NEED to use the summer to make some progress.
I have been calling all over the country, trying to find a summer session that is willing to accept a child who will not be attending the school. I, of course, contacted John Tracy Clinic about their summer sessions. The problem is that Miss Kat will turn 6, three days before the session starts. She will be too old. I wrote to them and they agreed to put Miss Kat on their "waiting list". I still haven't heard back from them yet.
BUT, I found another option! We are even lucky enough that it is local! The program is called SoundBeginnings. It is up north, two hours away, where Miss Kat's audiologist is. We went up and visited and we decided it was a great fit. Miss Kat will be getting pull out AVT, 4 times a week with a certified AV therapist and has two really great Teachers of the Deaf. The summer session is 6 full weeks!
I really liked the program. I love that they sing and play with music! This is something new that Miss Kat likes now, post CI. She has always liked music, but now she loves it. They sang "Twinkle Twinkle" and played with "sticks"....turns out Miss Kat has pretty good rhythm! We haven't really incorporated a lot of music into her life, but now we are going to start!
Also, the program has two different classes (one older, one younger) and Miss Kat's oral language functioning is right in between the two. She will be able to work on her expressive language in the younger class, and be a good model for the other kids, but the older class will challenger her and pull her up. I think it is a great thing.
So, barring any world event, Miss Kat and Momma will be spending June 22-July 30 away from home!
Kat Reading
5 comments:
Ugh- I can't believe she is aged out of the JTC program by just a few weeks! Too bad they don't go by "hearing age" rather than chronological age for kids. The soundbeginnings program sounds great, though, with the two age levels! I can't wait to hear how you like it.
We plan on doing JTC in 2010 (we have family that lives out there so we have free lodging as well). I didn't know there was another summer program like it- good to know about another option!
When Miss. Kat gets transfered to the oral school are you going to keep up with ASL and having her sign or no?
Of course we are going to keep ASL! We want Miss Kat to be bilingual. And I don't mean that we want to use signs in the bath or when her devices are off, I mean truely use ASL like we do now.
ASL is her first and primary language. I wish that we could leave her at her bi-bi school, but they just can't serve her changing needs. We have a limited amount of time to get the greatest benefit from her CI (research shows 3 years) so we need to get her the rehab and auditory learning NOW. But we want ASL to continue to be a strong part of her life everyday. She is Deaf and always will be. She will continue to want and need ASL and the Deaf community forever.
We are adding, not taking away.
Hello Am from Alabama. To be honest with you, John Tracy Clinic failed me when I was young in Oral program, been in John Tracy program since I was three until 9, guess what, I speak pretty good, not perfectly, but I can not read and write, no education, just speech, speech, my parents were upset. They put me in Deaf school (ASL) and I caught up my education and finally got my College degree. I rather use ASL eventhough I speak pretty good but worry too much how I speak the words correctly. No fun, rather use ASL, much comfortable. Now am 52 years old. Don't know if John Tracy Clinic change method or still use old method? I really don't care about that. I feel sorry for my parents that spend so much money on me through John Tracy Clinic. I Thank God for my ASL and my family (wife and twins) are happily married and family. You have a great day.
It's great that you're keeping her in the Deaf community. Keep surrounding her with ASL models. She already has spoken English models in her parents, relatives, etc.
Raising a child bilingually is an excellent idea. Just take a gander at French Immersion schools in Canada (Ontario). There is a great number of Canadians that believe bilingualism is the way to go (ie. French and English).
Now, if we can work on getting people to accept the idea of bilingualism in the form of English and ASL.
Too many people view bilingualism as two spoken languages, and ignore ASL as a valid language.
I realize this is off the topic of this blog posting, but can you tell us what got you to decide that ASL is the way to go rather than modes of communication i.e. Total Communication, SEE, etc? Was it a particular Deaf adult who helped enlighten you, or something you read? Was there something in your background that made you more amenable to bilingualism (i.e. a relative who is European and multilingual). I'm quite curious. Please do blog on this. I think this would be a valuable post to educate others seeing as you're a strong proponent of ASL and bilingual-biculturalism. (Obviously I haven't been following your blog for long.)
Shel
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