sevenhudsons
New Member
- Joined
- Jun 27, 2009
- Messages
- 9
- Reaction score
- 0
Hi everyone,
Our son Jason, 13, has been deaf since birth and mainstreamed all the way through school. We primarily sign but he also speaks and lip reads. He has an ASL interpreter in the classroom and spends one period a day in speech therapy as an elective class. Other than that, he's a typical middle schooler.
He's a wrestler, and very good at it. Last year as a 7th grader, he wrestled high school JV. They had an away meet at the state school for the deaf and blind. He won his match against an 11th grader. He came home and we had the following conversation:
"I want to go to deaf school."
"Why?"
"I spent the day with people like me. I want to do that all the time. I want to be with people who understand me when I sign, and who I can understand. I don't like trying to speak to people who can't understand me. I don't like trying to lip read people I can't understand. I don't like wearing hearing aids and pretending they help me understand better, 'cause they don't. I am a DEAF PERSON and I want to be with DEAF PEOPLE!"
We're at a crossroads. We want Jason to be able to function in the wider world, so we've always brought him up around hearing people. We don't want to limit him. He doesn't like the school where he is; part of that is related to his deafness and part of it isn't. We want him to be happy. He's a smart boy, and we think he's got a good understanding of what would make him happy. But we don't want to pull him out of the mainstream. This is a big step for us. What advice would you give us?
Thanks,
Alexandra and John, Jason's parents
Our son Jason, 13, has been deaf since birth and mainstreamed all the way through school. We primarily sign but he also speaks and lip reads. He has an ASL interpreter in the classroom and spends one period a day in speech therapy as an elective class. Other than that, he's a typical middle schooler.
He's a wrestler, and very good at it. Last year as a 7th grader, he wrestled high school JV. They had an away meet at the state school for the deaf and blind. He won his match against an 11th grader. He came home and we had the following conversation:
"I want to go to deaf school."
"Why?"
"I spent the day with people like me. I want to do that all the time. I want to be with people who understand me when I sign, and who I can understand. I don't like trying to speak to people who can't understand me. I don't like trying to lip read people I can't understand. I don't like wearing hearing aids and pretending they help me understand better, 'cause they don't. I am a DEAF PERSON and I want to be with DEAF PEOPLE!"
We're at a crossroads. We want Jason to be able to function in the wider world, so we've always brought him up around hearing people. We don't want to limit him. He doesn't like the school where he is; part of that is related to his deafness and part of it isn't. We want him to be happy. He's a smart boy, and we think he's got a good understanding of what would make him happy. But we don't want to pull him out of the mainstream. This is a big step for us. What advice would you give us?
Thanks,
Alexandra and John, Jason's parents