DHH Resource Room

[Guest guest]

Sharing what I have learned from other group - Deaf/Hard of Hearing

Adoption.

My oldest son recieves DHH service for 45 minutes this year as 1st

grader. The rest of the time, he's with his regular class.

Problem: Lack of socialization. He has two deaf 1st grade peers

that he interacts with during lunch and recess. The number

itself '3' is always bad news - two vs. one. Academically, he is a

grade above his hearing peers in literacy areas. Due to his ASL

acquisition when he first came home from Korea at age 3 (with no

language!), he is now acquiring English (reading and writing)as his

2nd language. It's truly amazing how fast kids can learn!

From the other group, I have learned and shared with my son's

school. They are very eager to do this; Reversed mainstreaming -

the DHH students with their TOD teacher for the majority of the day

(core subjects; literacy, math). A small number of hearing kids join

with the DHH students in the TOD classroom. The TOD teacher do

exactly same as the classroom teacher is teaching. In the first few

weeks, the TOD will be using both languages, ASL and English. As the

year go by, the TOD and hearing kids will sign at all times. The

hearing kids and deaf kids develop their lifelong friendship by being

together in smaller classroom, and communicating in one language.

I'm very excited about this concept. The current TOD told me that

she did this approach some years ago and found it very successful -

and those kids (hearing and deaf) are still friends after their

school years.

IEP is coming up .. I'm not exactly sure how I get this in the

writing. The TOD teacher said she will try to get the 'Writer's

workshop' set up in her classroom for my son, other 2 deaf kids and 4

or 5 hearing kids together. It will be about 2 half hours long

everyday. The hearing kids will natuurally learn ASL by

interacting with the deaf kids for so many hours during the school

year.