For parents of children with special needs, nothing is impossible!

Many of them in fact have found themselves becoming advocates of children’s rights to help give their kids a fighting chance in this society.

For instance, Janet Christensen was inspired to become a teacher by her experience in raising a child who is deaf.

“I had no intention of becoming a teacher until my son Justin was about 12 years old. Developing Justin’s language and comprehension was all consuming until he was about nine and I gave birth to my second child. Justin was over three years old when he was diagnosed with a profound hearing loss. Thus began our long hard journey of learning about his hearing loss, how to get him to wear his hearing aid, and how to support his development of listening skills,” Christensen recalls.

Christensen is the director of Deaf and Hard Hearing Program of Hearing and Speech Center in San Francisco, California, Christensen. With other world experts and professionals in the field of education, medical and community health care, social workers, parents with hearing impaired children and other disabilities, Christensen was recently in the country for the first International Conference on Aural Rehabilitation in Asia-Pacific (ICARAP) held at the Diamond Hotel recently.

She found herself working as a classroom aide in the toddler and preschool classrooms, falling in love with teaching young children with hearing loss as the days passed. “In many ways, it was so much easier than teaching my own son because they weren’t my children — but more often the challenge was greater also because they weren’t my children,” Christensen explains.

In her earlier teaching stints, Christensen used every tool that she knew, constantly looking for new ways to teach her toddler classroom because she did not want any of these children to be as far behind in language development as Justin was when he entered kindergarten.

“They progress at very different rates for many reasons but my goal is for each child to optimize their language potential and grow up without any barriers to achieving the career they dream about,” she adds.

During her talk, Christensen also shared with the audience how to develop appropriate expectations and goals for young children with hearing loss and how to work with different forms of amplification now available.

ICARAP gathered professionals committed to growing inclusive communities in taking bold steps to expand opportunities for all people to participate and learn. Overall chairperson Rebecca Santos shares that for the many years of serving for the deaf community, she is grateful to have the chance to bring everyone together towards one goal and commitment.  The four facets of deafness were discussed such as Paediatric (Re) Habilitation, Assessment, Resources, and Inclusion in the conference in an effort to generate public awareness and strengthen the involvement of various sectors in promoting early disability prevention, rehabilitation, and inclusion.

The conference also increased the familiarity of the parents and teachers of the hearing impaired with the use of operation, selection, and care of hearing aids, cochlear implants, FM system, and other assistive devices through demonstrations in learning and teaching situations.

Deaf education in the future

Prof. Guido Lichert from Belgium also talked on the “Trends and Issues on Deaf Education in the 21st Century”. Lichert has been initiating numerous national and European projects concerning deaf education by combining educational practice, counseling, and research for the past 32 years.

“Now more than ever before, a large segment of the population of congenitally deaf children have received access to spoken language perception during their most sensitive sensori-neural stage,” he shares.

He says that it appears that the new medical-technological possibilities such as newborn hearing screening programs (NHS) and high tech prosthesis like cochlear implants along with early intervention will increase the social-emotional and communicative match between many deaf children and their hearing parents.

“Unfortunately, this increasing match will affect the way these children will live their ‘deafness’,” he says.

Prof. Lichert emphasized that one also needs to focus on the acoustic quality of the living environment.

“Maybe one needs to be reminded that ‘less is more’ because decreasing the differences between interaction patterns and communication opportunities by hearing and deaf children requires an increased attention of the educator who is challenged to understand the specific nature of their children.”

He reminds professionals in family guidance that they will need to be responsive to and sensitive to coach and to empower parents for this newly-developing transactional processes.

Local experts also shared their expertise including Dr. Charlotte Chong on “Principles and Guidelines for Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Program Related to Hearing Loss,” Dr. Norberto Martinez on “Benefits of Neonatal Hearing Screening as a Lifetime Difference,” Dr. Rina Quintos on “Maternal Emotional Reactions Towards Results of Newborn Screening,” Mary Joy Abaquin on “Multiple Intelligence in the Classroom,” and Dr. Edilberto Dizon on “Psycho-Educational Assessment and Placement.” There were also case presentations that helped the participants on where to get help for from developmental pediatricians like Dr. Francis Dimalanta on “Developmental Assessment of Children with Hearing Loss,” Dr. Jocelyn Eusebio on “Management Strategies for Hearing Impairment,” and Dr. Jacqueline Navarro on “How to draw the line between deaf or autism.”

Meeting expectations

Marianita Abaya, president of Parent Council for the Welfare of the Hearing Impaired Children, Inc. (PCWHIC),  says that the conference helps parents like her to be more knowledgeable with new strategies and techniques in teaching and dealing with special kids. “It united parents to be the voice of their children and to show the world that they are also entitled to equal treatment. Hindi kami nawawalan ng pag-asa na may mas magandang bukas ang naghihintay sa mga anak namin,” she shares.

Abaya’s 12 year-old-son Kent Nicole is hearing-impaired. “When he was diagnosed at two and a half years old,  sobrang hirap tanggapin,” she shared. “But instead of wallowing in depression, I started to look for ways. At three, he had his first hearing aid. He now has a cochlear implant in one ear.”

For Roselle Ting, mother to three-year-old Elijah Cyrene who was diagnosed with hearing impairment at two years old , the conference was a learning garden. “I feel na marami akong matutunan dito especially when it comes to managing and handling my child’s behavior.” Elijah is now benefiting from hearing aids. “After niya magkaroon ng hearing aid, marami ng naging benefits sa kanya dahil mas madami na siyang nasasabi at nakakaintidi na siya ng simple commands.”