Progress Report
I think that it's about time for a "Speaker"
Page progress report, so here it is...
Hearing
James just turned 6 & is still doing well with his speakers.
We get new earmolds about every 6 months. He seems to grow out of them about the
time he goes up a shoe size! LOL I can't believe that this May will mark three
years since his hearing loss was diagnosed! In December 1998 we had his semi-annual
hearing test, and everything has remained unchanged since his diagnosis in May of '96.
His little brother, Kirk, had his annual hearing test ,and still tested in the
normal range! Since this was the 3 year mark for Kirk, and James' hearing loss was
detected at 3, I was a little apprehensive about it. It was quite a relief to see
the "normal" audiogram again!
Speech
On the speech front he's also making good progress! We have been
going to Bolesta Center for Auditory Verbal Therapy.
In November we tested his language skills & he was at or above age level
against hearing peers! We decided in December to enroll him in speech therapy with
the local (if you can call 40 minutes from home local!) public school. Since July,
he has learned to produce the /k/ & /g/ sounds, but they aren't as consistent as they
could be! I guess that a positive is that they are the ONLY sounds the qualified him
for the speech services. In the past month he has began to pronounce /th/ on a fairly
consistent basis. This is encouraging since it's not "age appropriate"
until age seven!
School
In August 1998 we started kindergarten. I say we
because James is homeschooled. The distance to the public school was so far that we
began looking into homeschooling even before he was 3. As the time got closer for
him to begin schooling the option became a more serious one. In February of 1998 I
met a family in our church that was homeschooling & also using a school where the kids
went to class twice a week in the mornings. This seemed like a great combination for
our family , and we checked it out in May. In August we started at New Covenant
Christian Academy. I love everything about it except for the 45 min drive in
traffic! LOL (Let's face it, though, I wouldn't have put either of
my kids on a school bus for 50 minutes to & from the "local" school, so I
would have had the 40 minute car trip twice a day five days a week anyway!) I also
subscribe to The Deaf Homeschool Newsletter & their e-mail list. If you
interested in either of these please e-mail me
& I'll do what I can to help you contact the proper people.
I've found that James is especially happy to see other people wearing
speakers, and particularly other children! I have found some websites where there are
pictures of other children wearing "speakers"! Soon I hope to display a picture
of James here, on the Speaker Page, with his speakers visible! Right now the only
ones that I have are pretty far off shots! If you would like to see him though you can
visit his web page!
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