Feedback Needed

You should talk to your speech and language therapist. She should be able to tell you what to do.

A regular ‘school screening’ is not sensitive enough if the child has fluid in his ears…my son screened perfectly in the usual tests…in first grade and third, and since he is visually dyslexic we put his school problems down to that. He is also shy, and hates school, so some of his odd behaviours — like ‘ignoring’ others who would say hello to him in the halls, we just ‘lived with’. The school was convinced he was ADD, so they did not suspect hearing problems either.

However, in Jan. of Gr. 3 we noticed he seemed ‘deaf’, especially when he had his winter hood on, and though reading had improved greatly, school attention had gotten worse. So I took him to an audiologist for a full workup — he had severe (!!!) loss in one ear and had to have tubes inserted. Audiologist said a school screening could easily miss this…and this sort of problem is complicated greatly as the hearing loss is directional — he may hear fine in a certain situation, but then if a noise interrupts on his ‘good side’ which is near open doorway or window…he will lose teacher who is on ‘bad side’…no wonder he seemed to ‘zone out’ frequently, but only at school, said the audiologist!

When we got to the specialist in spring of Gr. 3 (who had drained fluid from him when doing tonsils in SK), he said it was likely a large part of myson’s inattention in school — kids don’t struggle to hear unless they want to — my kid is focused on the clock and making it get to 3:30 faster, NOT on ‘doing what teacher/mommy want him to!’ So when teacher’s voice faded or was hard to follow, he just retreated to imagining what he would do after school or gazed into the fishtank or out the window, but did not realize he was having trouble hearing. And YES, tubes cleared up the problem…no longer ignored people who said hello in the halls, and you didn’t have to bang him on the head to get his attention when wearing a hood!

But he is still an ‘allergy’ kid, and he still had trouble ‘getting everything’ in Gr 4, especially on ‘snuffy days’ and markedly for a couple of weeks after a cold…interestingly, he had NO trouble this past year in Gr. 5 — in a nice quiet portable with a MALE teacher — who had a nice deep voice that carries well…

Having a chronic problem with fluid on one side, I can tell you that my hearing fluctuates greatly from day to day based on allergens in my environment, humidity, etc. — you may find a child has ‘good’ and ‘bad’ hearing days…so especially if school screening took place on a ‘good’ hearing day, there may still be an undx’d problem. If this child, like my son, ALSO has LD’s the hearing problem may be complicating the LD’s, really making his at-school life difficult (and yours!)

In a very non-professional amateur opinion way, I’m sure this is part of the puzzle for many APD kids…my child, unlike the modern ‘norm’ was not raised in a hectic daycare with lots of noise and action, but as an only child at home with a loud mother who also has hearing problems. Perhaps this is why receptive/expressive language developed normally and we saw no trouble until we hit school, despite tonsil problems and frequent ear infections before age 5…good luck, you are an excellent teacher!

Frequent ear infections are a very common indicator on dx checklists for dyslexia. I imagine it is a risk factor.

—des

I am also an allergy/ear infection person, and that probably led to some of my difficulties in social and group situations, the fact that I work much better one-to-one, and the fact that I do better on written than oral in all four languages. Yes, definitely a real issue!

SJ, yes, push to get the kid a thorough evaluation. But meanwhile, you know what to do: (and this is the same advice you will get if he is diagnosed anyway, right?)
Continue to check over instructions with him individually. Seat him near you and make sure he is focused on you as you are talking — he needs to watch as well as listen, both to keep mental focus and also to use lip-reading which many people develop as amateurs. Remove noises and distractions from your class as much as possible. Speak clearly and distinctly and face the class when talking — hey, that helps everyone.
And do what you can to make sure this student has a good phonics base for independent reading and writing — he is at risk if a guess-and-hope approach was used, and he needs it more than most.

Thanks much guys. I am going to talk to the mother this coming week.

I agree with chelelm. It is always good to check with your speech/language person. If you’re not sure what to do, that person wpuld be a good resource for you to use. She may be able to do some preliminary foundational work, and then she can steer you in the right direction about where to go from there.

Good luck!

Sandy
www.ldperspectives.com

she doesn’t have access to an SLP for ‘quick consults’ regarding a child who is not on the SLP’s list — in my system, you wouldn’t have a hope, I know that even as a parent! Resources are spread WAY too thin…the SLP’s up here are all consultants, and charge by the kid and the hour — no teacher gets a chance for a quick conversation ‘off the bill’.

But great advice, in the case where she DOES have access…in a society that truly valued children and education, one would be on staff in every school…she/he could share space with the RN! LOL, (well, sort of!) we don’t have any of those, either. The reason I prefer working as an Admin. in the manufacturing sector is while I DO perform the occasional first aid task, they don’t expect me to administer medications — this is routinely expected from school secretaries…