Oral preschool for deaf children wants to grow

Miss-Delectable

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Oral preschool for deaf children wants to grow - News

The Luke Lee Listening, Language, and Learning Lab is sharing the gift of oral communication to hearing impaired children from across the state.

This preschool for deaf children is the only one in West Virginia that offers a completely oral education, as opposed to an only sign language curriculum.

Cherese Lee is a mother of twin boys, one of which is deaf. Originally from West Virginia, Lee and her husband wanted more than anything to have their hearing impaired son Luke learn to speak, but there was not a program that offered oral communication to deaf children. Lee immediately went to the Board of Education to argue her case for her need of an oral communicating preschool for her son and other children.

"I knew there were other families in the same situation who wanted their children to have the opportunity to become oral," Lee said. "The opportunity for a child to speak is invaluable."

After presenting research that shows funding for a school to make children oral would cost less in the long run by eliminating the cost for interpreters, the program received a three-year grant from the state and they have used that money in the three years of operation. Lee continued to lobby for permanent state funding, and soon after received the approval for steady funds.

"Everyone was excited about it," Lee said West Virginia really needed something like this."

"It's a fairly normal preschool classroom with group activities, art, math, and cooking; everything we do is to promote language," program director, Jodi Cottrell, said

According to an article written by the Public Broadcasting System, "Deaf children who start with sign language must learn English as a second language. For this reason, deaf children should be taught using oral education methods."

The program has children from Cabell, Putnam, Logan, Raleigh, and Boone Counties. The high success rate of the preschool should generate interest for other programs to start throughout the state.

"Our success is to make sure every child is an oral communicator and attend a mainstream kindergarten," Cottrell said. "We want to consider ourselves the pilot program for the state and hope that others will start up."

There are 6 children in the class this fall, ranging from 2 to 6 years old. They all have some level of hearing loss, but are learning to speak. Cottrell said they are all on different levels of communication, but are all oral in some way.

Speech and language pathologists work with the children through speech therapy. Graduate students are also involved with the program and all receive a chance to work with the children and gain clinical hours.
 
Interesting thread . . . Well, I won't be surprise if it effects on ASL-based deaf schools in future. . .
 
Didn't we already have schools like this? and failed?

I think the mother are a little naive. But then again, her child may have cochlear implant...
 
Oh, I am sick of this about oral school for d/Deaf children. :barf: This hearing mother like every AGB and Audists never stop at trying to get deaf children to have oral training to speak if not lipreading. When will it stop on abusing deaf children being pressure into learning to speak if they don't want to? His mother is forcing him to speak whether he like it or not. I think it is disgusting and it is epic fail. :thumbd:
 
Look away... look away... nothing new. It has been going on for a few hundred years.

I can't really fault people though. They are afraid of what they don't know, and thus biased against what they don't know. I means... sign language is scary to most people out there. They grew up oral, so they don't see it as a natural alternative because they are not exposed to them or they are not immersed in it.

Although I wish there is a more effective way to prove our points that oralism doesn't work other than waiting for 20 years to see what society raises as mistakes.
 
Although I have no kids nor any experience as d/Deaf person in mainstream <which is why I don't post much in those threads, but read lots; I also DO have experience of someone with undiagnosed LD in mainstream, which was isolating in its own way> I agree with you guys - I understand it different now since I am on AD, then maybe I would have a couple years ago. And again, emphasis on "language" equaling speech:roll: - ASL IS a language. Promotion of their own agenda regardless of effect on child:(
 
What is Public Broadcasting System and where is the article that they claimed that oral education is the way to go?????

And I would love to see what is the cost for the deaf people to see mental health counselor?? Probably high due to all that isolation.
 
The Luke Lee Listening, Language, and Learning Lab is sharing the gift of oral communication to hearing impaired children from across the state.

The "gift" of oral communication? *gag*
 
What is Public Broadcasting System and where is the article that they claimed that oral education is the way to go?????

And I would love to see what is the cost for the deaf people to see mental health counselor?? Probably high due to all that isolation.

PBS-- You know the one that did "Through Deaf Eyes" and "Sound and Fury."

I have a feeling that the writer of the article misinterpreted the data they came across.

Sound and Fury - Deaf Culture - Living with Deafness

PBS's "Sound and Fury - Deaf Culture - Living with Deafness" said:
schoolDo deaf people have to go to special schools?

In the past most deaf people attended special private schools for the deaf; the first in the U.S. opened in 1817. Over the years there have been heated battles over the best methods of instruction for the deaf, most of them centering on the question of sign language vs. oral-based education. Despite these ongoing controversies, laws passed in the mid 1970s gave children with special needs "equal and appropriate" education within the public school system. Today, many deaf children attend public schools where they are offered a combination of special instruction and general studies with their hearing peers.

One of the greatest challenges faced by deaf people is the acquisition of language skills. People who are born with hearing problems or develop them very early do not learn spoken language the way hearing people do. Since written English is based on spoken language, deaf children have difficulty learning English and expanding their vocabularies over time. Children who first learn to communicate using sign language will have a harder time learning English, since American Sign Language is not based on spoken or written English. Deaf children who start with sign language must learn English as a second language. For these reasons, many deaf children are taught using oral education methods that concentrate on English. Nonetheless, not being able to hear language makes it harder to improve language skills. For all these reasons, deaf and hard of hearing people often have lower literacy levels than their hearing peers. Using a 1996 standardized testing assessment, the Gallaudet Research Institute analyzed a sample group of 926 deaf students between the ages of 17 and 18. The results were approximately equivalent to those of an equal survey of fourth graders taking the same test, meaning that the median literacy level for 17 - 18 year olds who are deaf is the same as that of fourth grade hearing students. This figure, however, reflects English reading comprehension skills only, not intelligence levels.
 
After presenting research that shows funding for a school to make children oral would cost less in the long run by eliminating the cost for interpreters
Ummm not quite. There are still a significent percentage of orally skilled kids who use 'terps in the classroom. ALSO.....what about oral 'terps?Don't THEY cost the same as Sign 'terps?
Besides, even thou it costs less "educationally" the health care costs for raising an oral deaf kid is sky high. (they need speech therapy, the best hearing aids and CIs etc)
Not to mention I wonder if the research may have been biased. b/c it may have been done on the super high achievers.....you know....the ones where it's a given they'll go to Name Brand University? There are A LOT of AG Bad members who are like that. I have to say I don't think that it's the method that creates sucess....it's b/c most AG Bad members are the hyper overacheiver types. Meaning they would have been very suessful if they'd been ASL.
 
Oh, please! :roll:

No wonder they are still behind with the world like usual. Probably they had no idea how ASL effectiveness does... and were possibly manipulated by the AGBads knowing that they are way out of touch with the rest of the world (dumb-down) to stick with the oral methods, I wonder? :hmm: lol
 
Ummm not quite. There are still a significent percentage of orally skilled kids who use 'terps in the classroom. ALSO.....what about oral 'terps?Don't THEY cost the same as Sign 'terps?
Besides, even thou it costs less "educationally" the health care costs for raising an oral deaf kid is sky high. (they need speech therapy, the best hearing aids and CIs etc)
Not to mention I wonder if the research may have been biased. b/c it may have been done on the super high achievers.....you know....the ones where it's a given they'll go to Name Brand University? There are A LOT of AG Bad members who are like that. I have to say I don't think that it's the method that creates sucess....it's b/c most AG Bad members are the hyper overacheiver types. Meaning they would have been very suessful if they'd been ASL.


yep, definitely not true. I had an terp who typed everything for me in court. So we have to pay to hire someone plus technologies on top of that for people who can't hear very well and don't know ASL. nope it won't be cheaper on the long run. I can't believe people worry about the expenses.

but yeah, best CI and hearing aids because it is the only communication source I have and itself does not make me hear as well as a hearing person. without it, I'm lost.
 
After presenting research that shows funding for a school to make children oral would cost less in the long run by eliminating the cost for interpreters

I KNEW it! It is all about cost effectiveness. Who cares about the children's needs? It is about the needs of society. How selfish!
 
After presenting research that shows funding for a school to make children oral would cost less in the long run by eliminating the cost for interpreters

I KNEW it! It is all about cost effectiveness. Who cares about the children's needs? It is about the needs of society. How selfish!

It's always about the money.
 
It's also about the school making money. The school makes money by giving parents what they want.
 
It's also about the school making money. The school makes money by giving parents what they want.

And part of that is lack of awareness about the Deaf culture, and anything about the Deaf culture isn't really portrayed in a positive light in mass media. The only reason why I got a bilingual-bicultural education early on was because my mom used to be an active part of the culture before she had me.
 
And part of that is lack of awareness about the Deaf culture, and anything about the Deaf culture isn't really portrayed in a positive light in mass media. The only reason why I got a bilingual-bicultural education early on was because my mom used to be an active part of the culture before she had me.

Wow, that's lucky. If only all parents were involved in Deaf culture before having a deaf kid!
 
I KNEW it! It is all about cost effectiveness. Who cares about the children's needs? It is about the needs of society. How selfish
Not to mention that it sounds like the mom has bought into the myth that there's " Freedom in Listening and Talking" Yes, speech is an awesome tool....BUT having that as the only tool is just as limiting as only having sign as the only tool!
 
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