As I read different blogs and comments, I keep running into a similar comment. ASL teaches the child language. Speech therapy teaches kids to parrot sounds. ASL involves brain development. Speech therapy revolves around voice and ears only.
I would like to clearly and distinctly refute that claim. First off, I fully agree that teaching ASL teaches language. No question there. But speech therapy today must be way different than 20+ years ago. At least it is for kids learning language with a cochlear implant. Before we go any farther, I want to stress that I believe ASL and verbal language can and should compliment each other. Deaf kids should be taught both. But there is a reason that speech therapy is so important for implant recipients.
The determination of success (or failure) of the cochlear implant comes down to how well the person can make sense of sound. One of the shortcomings of hearing aids is that if there are no residual hair cells in the cochlea, no amount of amplification can get sound through the cochlea to the auditory nerve, and on to the brain. With the implant, if you have a functioning auditory nerve, and can get a good insertion of the electrode array into the cochlea, sound WILL get to the brain. The question really is how well can the brain make sense of the sounds it is now receiving? Think of it like a projector that is out of focus. The sound coming in from the implant is fuzzy. The brain has the ability to make the sound quality better and clearer. In effect, it focuses the projector to sharpen the image. How well the brain can focus the sound is the key to the implant’s success.
In the “olden” days, speech therapy consisted of trying to teach a deaf person how to imitate a sound that they may or may not even be able to understand. It focused on teaching the person how to speak clearly enough to be understood. Many of the sounds they learned to make, they never learned to understand.
With the implant, the key is to understand the sounds you are hearing. Verbal language is all about putting meaning to the sounds you are hearing. Yes, speech articulation is part of it, but the majority of the emphasis is on learning to understand the sounds you are hearing. It is all about the brain. 100%. You learn to make sense of sound, put meaning to words, paraphrase what you see and hear, initiate and reply to conversations. In short, you are learning verbal language. The success of the implant rests on how completely you learn language. And how well you learn language rests on how well your brain is able to interpret the sounds the implant is giving you. Meaningless parroting has no place here. It is all about brain development. Speech therapy is the way the brain learns to focus the sound, so the sound has meaning. I really think it is no longer appropriately named. Maybe calling it speech therapy was what was happening in the “olden” days.
As a parent who has been intimately involved with my daughter’s speech therapy over the years, first with her initial implant and now with her second bilateral implant, I can tell you that there is one thing I know well. It may be called speech therapy. What she is getting is NOT speech therapy. It is LANGUAGE therapy.
K.L.
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13 comments:
Right. If you could find a volunteer to translate this into ASL, maybe people will understand the concept of modern speech therapy.
Anonymous said, "Right. If you could find a volunteer to translate this into ASL, maybe people will understand the concept of modern speech therapy"
My comment: "I thought users of ASL can read this! Can't they?" Why does everything have to be in ASL?
What's up with this, really? Don't get me wrong. I'm 100% pre-lingually, culturally Deaf and a native user of ASL. However, I never had use for any kind of hearing device. I scour this blog because this is often intelligently written unlike many others. I'm one who crave intellectual stimulation not often found in the Deaf world. This idea is far-reaching. Volunteers. Ah! They have been taken advantage too much. I'm not too thrilled about this. I'm under the impression that the Cochlear Implant industry is well-fueled and hold strong interest in this blog. I'm sure a payment can be arranged." :::sarcasm:::
Another great post! It made me think about how ALL children learn language. Parroting is a part of baby babblings, but I think they attach meanings to the sounds they hear long before they can articulate. Bottle becomes ba-ba and so on. I don't think that's much different from a Deaf child mimicing the signs he sees. Mimicry and parroting is just part of language learning. However if you can't hear what you're parroting, then there's a disconnect in the brain and the parroting exercise becomes meaningless. It would be like teaching a blind child to sign. (which I know can be done, but they don't sign exactly the same way.)
Robert, the translation will be for DVTV users. Not all deaf people have good English literacy due to many variables, including language deprivation. This'll be a good opportunity to educate them as there is a lot of misinformation there. It's up to the blogger to decide whether it's worth the energy to invest in educating the whole deaf community or not.
I agree that our blogs need to be translated into ASL to make it accessible to more deaf people. Unfortunately, due to discrimination and oppression of ASL-CI users within the deaf community, it is very difficult to find people who are willing to reveal their identity on vlogs. If anyone is interested in translating our blogs into ASL, please do email "aslciusers@gmail.com" as they would be thrilled to have you on board to help out.
In fact, I am not sure if the CI companies in the USA (AB, Cochlear and Med-El) are aware of this blog. This blog would be a nice addition to the information kit that they pass out to parents and adult recipients of cochlear implants along with information about ASL and the deaf community.
Hi! Great blog! I have a question. The other day, I was at a meeting where the audiologist said that if a child is not receiving sound input by age 7 years, such as with hearing aids, the auditory cortex of the brain closes down completely and cannot be used for hearing. (Presumably, the resources of that part of the brain will be allocated for other purposes.) After that point, sound input provided by the CI to a deaf child will have no meaning. Is that true? If so, then I would assume that speech therapy, in the old-fashioned sense of the word, would indeed be more like teaching a deaf individual to imitate sounds, rather than a tool to teach meaningful language. On the other hand, if a deaf child HAS received auditory input from an early age, whether via hearing aids or a CI, he or she would be able to benefit from "speech therapy" meaningfully. In other words, auditory and verbal language skills can develop simply because the child hears more. Comment, please?
Anon (comment 6). That is a great question. The auditory cortex never shuts down completely, but the less auditory input it got before age 7, the less able it will be to adapt to sound after age 7. There are so many variables. Did the child have any hearing at birth? Did they get aided? How much interest do they have in verbal communication? All these can influence how flexible the brain still may be.
Bottom line? The earlier the child is implanted, the easier time they will have in making sense of sound. I posted a blog about aural brain development right at the start of this blog, last year. Here is the link.
http://aslci.blogspot.com/2008/03/brain-and-cochlear-implants.html
It might help answer the question more completely.
Your comments are so well said and very clearly expressed. I applaud your dedication to your child and your understanding of language and the importantance of therapy to acquire it. A very recent article in Yahoo about bilingual learning and the importance and ease of learning language(s) before the age of 7 supports your findings. I am a CODA who is hard of hearing. I walk in both worlds and appreciate your dedication.
This entry seems to emphasis the receptive aspect of language over the expressive. Yes, one huge part of CI-related ST is sound identification. But that is only one part of it. The other part is expressive: Learning how to make the sounds. "Parroting" may seem derogatory, but that is certainly how it feels to me as with my CI I still cannot hear major components of speech. As anyone who has taught hearing people ASL knows, expressive and receptive skills are separate but equally important.
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