My youngest son has a moderate-severe hearing loss in one ear but only a mild loss in the other ear. He is seven years old. I thought I would share a story as close to his words as I can remember.
“Mum, I hate it when we play Chinese Whispers, and Karen (his teacher) does not tell me we are going to play it first.”
“Why?”
“Because I might be sitting in the wrong spot.”
“Wrong spot?”
“Yeah, this ear is Deaf you know!” he says, pointing to his ear, as if this information were utterly new to me. “And I need the whispering to be in my other ear, or people will get angry with me for spoiling the game.”
“What are you going to do about it?”
After some time, he states, “I know. I will tell Karen to go this way around (motioning in a circle so that the whispers will be in his good ear) and not this way!”
Given the chance, children are great at finding solutions to their hearing difficulties. I encourage both my children to come up with these themselves (sometimes with a little help) and try and talk to people (in this case, the teacher) about the trouble they are having.
