Trying to learn and think and change so quickly is as the saying goes, "trying to take a sip of water from a fire hose." Last night, my husband and I put our son to sleep and then sat on the couch together in silence like two slugs. "I don't want to think anymore today," I said to him. He responded with a nod and a, "same here." The great thing about the internet is the access to so much information. The bad thing about the internet is trying to filter and fish through the information to find quality stuff.
Raising a baby is difficult enough without the added challenges of hearing impairment. You have to look at everything in a whole new way. Which TV shows are still fun for him without sound? Which of his toys are more visual and tactile? How do you make him "listen" to you when he refuses to look at you? A hearing child can ignore you, but they will still hear what you are saying to them. They may just choose not to act on the command. My child can choose not to look at me and I have no way of delivering the command at all. Do you know how difficult it is to make a child look at you when they are clearly focused on something else? It can be all but impossible!
If you know me well, you know that I am an action person. I have to be DOING something all the time. It makes me feel like I have control of something. My action item today is making our own ASL flashcards. I want my son to have personalize flash cards. I am taking photos of things in his own environment for the fronts of the cards. For example, the Mommy card will have a picture of me rather than a random cartoon adult. These cards are honestly probably more for us than for him, but it makes me feel useful.
Are you curious about ASL? Would you like to learn a few signs yourself? It will make my heart smile to watch those that love my child make an effort to communicate with him using signs. Check out this website for video instruction of some basic signs:
http://www.aslpro.com/cgi-bin/aslpro/aslpro.cgi
Please feel free to leave comments with any information, websites, etc that you think may be helpful or interesting to us!
For those of you who do not know me I am Ms. Kim - Elijah's nanny. I love love love this smart, happy, sweet little boy. I have had the privilege of caring for him since he was 5 1/2 weeks old. It has been one joyous day after the other. Elijah laughed out loud at an early age and he has not missed a day since. And I mean those deep belly laughs. As I walked up to his front door today the first thing I heard was his laughter and the first thing I saw was his glee filled face as he played with his daddy. If you do not do something to make him laugh he will just start laughing at you until you start laughing with him. He is contagious. If you have not spent any time with this happy guy you are missing out. He will make your day and he will make you laugh. Caring for Elijah and becoming part of his extended family has been one of the best things that has ever happened to me, Anthony and Saylor - my family.
ReplyDeleteI also want to say I stand in amazement at Elijah's parents, Marshay and Tad. They hit a brick wall this week that knocked the breath out of them. After a few deep breaths they walked back up to that brick wall with hammers in their hands. God gave Elijah to the right people.
I am new to the hearing impairment world and I am not sure of all the proper terms nor am I fluent in sign language, but I am learning and so is my family. I share Marshay's concern about television programs and his toys, take, for instance, Sesame Street, have you ever watched it with the sound turned off? Isn't very interesting is it? I got to take some time and think about this. Any suggestions and experience will be greatly appreciated by this nanny.
My kids enjoy Signing Time. Bella has learned several signs even just watchin a couple of times. Our library has a lot of them and a few other series too. They make learning signs fun and easy for my kids and I've learned them too.
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