hearing impaired class for apraxics??

[Guest guest]

My daughter Hope is 3 1/2 and was Dx'd apraxic back when she was 18 months old

by her neurologist. We did the whole EI therapy route and she's now in the

Intermediate Unit that works with the school district. She attends a special

needs preschool that the IU runs and her particular class is in one of the

elementary schools. She goes 2 days a week for 1/2 a day, total 6 hrs of class

time. She also gets 30 minutes of group speech therapy while she's in class and

an additional 30 minutes of one on one therapy outside of class.

Today Hope's teacher asked to speak with me when I picked Hope up. Apparently

there are a lot of kids who have late birthdays and are just now aging out of

the EI serives and going into the IU. Many of them will be attending the

preschool classes. With the area where a lot of these kids live, Hope's

preschool class will be expanding to 13-18 kids. They like the class size to be

10 or less, so they're looking into moving some of the kids out of Hope's class.

While the IU teachers and therapist were having this discussion and they were

looking at the student's records trying to see which kids may be able to

transition to the 3 day a week class, one of the teachers mentioned that in her

class she has room to take a couple more students. She is a preschool teacher

and an SLP, and her class is hearing impaired students. But she's been

attending workshops and classes, and has been working with apraxic kids.

Usually her class is limited to the hearing impaired so they can be sure they

have room, but she noticed Hope's dx and offered to take Hope into her class if

I'm willing. There wont be a transportation issue since I drive hope to school,

and I live not far from where this class is. This class runs 2 full days a week

for 3 year olds and 4 full days a week for 4 year olds. Her teacher says they

would definately miss her, and it's not that they want her out of the class.

But they try and find the best class for the child and in her opinion this

hearig impaired class would be better for her since the teacher is an SLP and

they have multiple speech and hearing therapists in all the time.

So does anyone have any thoughts or opinions? Anyone sent their apraxic child

to a hearing impaired class?

Toni

[Guest guest]

> So does anyone have any thoughts or opinions? Anyone sent their apraxic

child to a hearing impaired class?

Well is deaf and apracic and so he is in an HI class. Good thing-

small class size- 7 max! Our teacher is great for HI and is learning on

apraxia but not helpful in that area. The SLP who just came back from

maternity leave is good w/ apraxia but that is only 20 min a week- so we do

outside therapy 2 other times a week. I would suggest visiting. An HI

preschool ( is 3...) is very different from a regular or even PPI

preschool and each one looks different- ie: I was going to keep him home

because the only one in our area was terrible...they opened a new one w/ a

wonderful teacher and we went for it. If you want I can tell you what our

typical day is but it might look very different.

Shoot back any ?? you may have

Amy

[Guest guest]

Hi Toni,

As you probably already know I believe these type of schools for

apraxic children are incredible. And yes Tanner went to one during preschool and

is

not hearing impaired at all -and is now in a mainstream academically

advanced first grade class with straight A's (still!) and he is both

Mr. Social and Mr. Cool. Even though Tanner doesn't have

any hearing impairment at all, if he still has a noticeable speech

impairment when he " grows up " and society is still as lame as it is

now about verbal disabilities and how they judge those who have even

minor impairments of speech as cognitively inferior -I've joked I'm

going to buy Tanner some hearing aids he can wear when he doesn't

feel like being judged! (or he can borrow his cousin's who is

hearing impaired and has a speech impairment)

Here is an archive:

" Mild hearing loss in a child however is different. Ability to hear

is critically important while speech is still developing. My nephew

also attended the Summit Speech School in New Providence, NJ

http://www.oraldeafed.org/schools/summit/ where my son Tanner went.

Even though Tanner and many of the other apraxic children in the

school had normal hearing -all of our children were schooled with

professionals who were fully aware of the proper way to educate and

provide therapy to a child with the duel diagnosis (which is not

uncommon) of speech problem/hearing loss. Lots of multisensory

approaches. Hence the base for The Association Method School.

http://www.usm.edu/dubard/associat.html

As I posted here when I posted one of my first emails -I first

thought of this

type of schooling for

Tanner within days of his diagnosis (and at the time was shot down

by this one parent who at the time ran the only grouplist for

apraxia who also tried to shoot me down on EFAs and the importance of

neuromedical MDs) As it ended up a few years after Tanner and many

others in our group in NJ started to succeed in the Summit Speech

School -and the Lakedrive School http://www.mtlakes.org/ld/ , Dr.

Joan Sheppard from Columbia

http://www.cherab.org/news/meetings/eventsmay2001.html did a

presentation at the ASHA conference on " Teaching

hearing apraxic children at schools for the hearing impaired and

deaf " to talk about how successful this is. (ASHA -is that the

organization that is now calling it childhood apraxia of speech and

that blocks out all the information to the public so only CCC SLPs

can read the information....I guess it's a wash then. Who wants

anyone to start using that stupid name childhood apraxia of speech

for a condition one does not outgrow?!! Can we send them a link to

276 month old (or if we want to talk about it in years -23 year

old) 's talking page update to put on their childhood apraxia

of speech page?)

There are two types of schools for the deaf -I like the oral based

model due to the wonderful speech models Tanner had. I would have

liked a bit more sign -but in the end it didn't matter.

Summit Speech School is an oral based school that does not encourage

sign -even though they will acknowledge it if used. As

Kanter who we all loved and now miss once told me -the theory is

that a deaf child that does not speak verbally by the age of 5 most

likely will never speak, while one can learn sign at any age.

As we've gone into in the past -there is a huge amount of

controversy in the deaf world on cochlear implants. Those that are

just into sign " deaf culture " say it's " mutating " the child. I like

the response from one of the MD dads in Tanner's class to this

comment when a deaf man " told him off in sign " due to his son's

cochlear implants " So if my child had a heart defect you are saying I

should just allow him to die? Is that also a mutation to try to

fix that? "

I know apraxic children that were schooled at both types of hearing

impaired schools and did well. However again I prefer the oral

based model based on personal observations of my own son and the

many others in this group who attended the Summit Speech School with

him.

Here is a list of websites for schools for the deaf

http://clerccenter.gallaudet.edu/InfoToGo/schools-usa.html

=====

[Guest guest]

Beth,

How were they able to diagnose such an auditory problem at such a

young age? Is it CAPD (Central Auditory Processing Disorder)?

Pam

> My daughter Casey is 2 and has been diagnosed with apraxia and an

auditory

> disorder of unknown etiology. She is just now starting in a

program for

> hearing impaired children. We were hesitant at first at how well

we would " fit in " ,

> or if the program would be appropriate for Casey. The other

children in the

> program all have cochlear implants or other amplification.

Casey's " hearing "

> is just fine, according to testing, but her brain just doesn't

seem to process

> the auditory information that it is getting. After spending only

2 days

> there we are VERY sure that this is a great class for her. We are

so thrilled to

> have a program like this made available to us.

> Best of luck in whatever you decide!

> Beth

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