Today was a mixed day. We started the day with our last meeting with Miss Kat's SLT. She started going over Miss Kat's testing. I got really upset. On the PLS-IV, she got 2 years 7 months expressive language level, and 2 years 11 months receptive language. I just got really overhelmed. I felt like she was making so much progress and when I saw those numbers I got really depressed and overwhelmed. She is 6 and she barely made it to 2 1/2. What are we supposed to do??
So, the teachers told me, since I don't like to consider her hearing age only 7 months (she had hearing aids for 4 years 7 months before her activation, does that time count for nothing??), what if we split the difference. We take half her hearing aid time, plus the CI. So, that would be 31 months or 2 years 5 months......hmmmm, maybe she is doing ok
Kat Reading
5 comments:
By that verbiage, most non-CI Deaf adults today would be babies ranging from 0 to about 10 years of age considering hearing aid use before drawer storage.
Considering their accomplishments, it is a meaningless measure based on the primacy of hearing.
Don't listen to that siren song.
First, I want to echo the thoughts of so many others in CICircle after your heartbreaking post. You and Miss Kat will be OK! I joke about hauling out Hamlet for Li-Li to practice, but Oh, my gosh, that's not where she is, and considering a wee one's propensity for repetition, how annoying would that be to hear 'Frailty, thy name is woman' again and again at the going rate.
Seriously, you are providing so many communication paths, giving her all-access. She's obviously a bright little girl with a brand new way of hearing to wrap her brain around. She'll find her way with your loving guidance.
And yes, she accomplished so much with hearing aids that will provide a great framework for language. But you know better than I what a very different ability that is from learning how to listen in this whole new way. Give her time to catch up and rewire that wonderful little brain for this extraordinary new input.
I like to think about some of these tests the same way I look at my horoscope when I come across it: if I like it, I accept it. If I don't like it, I'll pick another one that fits me more accurately. Some days I just find what's positive in all of them and make them work for me :)
Li-Li's Mom
Wow! It seems to me that the video clips you posted a month or two ago do *not* reflect an expressive language level of 2yr 7mo. Either the videos were not representative of Katrina's day-to-day language, or the testing does not accurately reflect Katrina's abilities. Is it possible that Miss Kat was tired out or not in a mood to cooperate?
David
Hi Miss Kat's Mom: I'm reading an excellent book right now with a chapter about the very thing you're talking about. The book title is "Deaf Cognition: Foundations and Outcomes," and the editors are Marc Marschark and Peter C. Hauser. The chapter "Efficacy and Effectiveness of Cochlear Implants in Deaf Children" is authored by Pisoni, Conway, Kronenberger, Horn, Karpicke, and Henning. Maybe if you used Google Scholar, you could find a link to the original article? I've only read a few pages but was spellbound. Basically, it talks about how the tools used to show whether or not a CI "works" are not necessarily a reflection of how Miss Kat uses language in the real world. I encourage you and your readers to check it out, if not buy the entire book. It was published in 2008 so the information is very current. Marc Marschark and Patricia Spencer are the series editors for the Perspectives on Deafness publications by Oxford Press.
That refers to "hearing age". The longer a child has access to spoken language, the more language they should be acquiring. So, yes, if someone has never wore amplification, that is probably reflected in their spoken language ability.
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