As long-time readers probably know, getting captioning on school videos has been a struggle for me, (and I'm sure many other D/HoH students as well). All of my teacher have dealt with the situation differently, and sometimes I can understand the video pretty well without captions, so long as I don't have to take notes and can just concentrate on the listening part. Other times, it's some animated video narrated by an Irish guy, and I'm completely lost. In one of my classes we're watching a video that takes 3 class days to watch. It's in a two year class for freshmen and sophomores, so I had these teachers (there are 2 teachers- I have 60 kids in my class) last year. They've always been really accommodating and helpful, so they made sure to get a video with subtitles.
Well, once they went to play it, they discovered these subtitles were only available in Spanish or French. So, I got a summary of the movie, plugged my FM into the speakers, and used French subtitles. I could understand a large amount between my hearing and French skills. It actually wasn't too confusing reading in French while listening in English, and it wasn't certainly much better than having nothing. I always thought learning French would come in handy, but being able to read French subtitles never really entered my mind!
Showing posts with label captions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label captions. Show all posts
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
The GED of IEP's- A Guest Post
The following is a guest blog post, as written by "Moxy", a fellow teenage girl with hearing loss. I'm sure she would greatly appreciate any comments! Are you interested in writing a guest blog post? Post a comment or email me with the topic you would like to write about, and I will get back to you.
So, you've accepted that your child has a hearing loss. Your kid is enrolled in school, and there's talk of an IEP. What can I tell you about your IEP? Not a lot that your audiologist, teacher, or teacher of the deaf can't tell you. I'm not an expert on IEPs. I've sat in on my own IEP meeting once, which, in my opinion, was horrible. It was the first one that I was asked to attend, and I basically sat there, missing class, while teachers, my mother, a school psychologist I had never met, a hearing teacher/psychologist I had met once before, informally, sat and spoke about me as if I wasn't there. I, if you can't tell, am not a fan of IEP's.
A quick background, however, so you know where I'm coming from. I'm a hard of hearing high school student. I wear hearing aids and use an FM system in class (for those uninitiated, the FM is a wireless microphone my teacher wears like a lanyard. There are small "boots" on my hearing aids that pick up the signal. This is supposed to give me the effect of the teacher speaking directly next to me), and I enjoy long walks on the beach (Not really, the sand/ocean "white noise"/ocean spray isn't great for hearing equipment).
The IEP is what, essentially, requires that my teachers wear my FM. It also explains where I should sit in the room, what conditions might be adverse to my learning [Read: bad lighting, uncarpeted rooms, large classes, heavy facial hair/accents], and what (if anything) additional I may require [FM use, captioned media, extra time on testing (I don't get that one either)]. "BUT!" I can *almost* hear you saying, "Isn't your IEP a lifesaver? Doesn't it mean you can relax, knowing you'll have unrestricted access to communication and information, just like everything else?! What a breakthrough!?" But the IEP is not this. Often, unless a teacher knows they will be meeting with my Teacher of the Deaf, they don't read my IEP. On the first day of school this year, I had one teacher ask if "the hearing aids are all, or do you have anything else going on?" What?! My TotD-provided printout, carefully hi-lited with the needs specific to each class, determined by a conversation about this very act of explanation... didn't cover this.
However, being a fairly confident teenager in my own right, I laugh it off, say no, briefly explain my FM (I'll already turn it on when I give it to you, if you need to, you can turn it off, here's how, I can also turn it off from my hearing aids, so if you forget it's fine. Just remember to turn it back on, or, if you for some reason take it off, to put it back on, so I don't have to awkwardly/embarrassingly interrupt the class, telling you I've been lost for the last 5 minutes because you forgot), and take a seat. You seem content. You reply, after a minute, to let me know if you can do anything, whatever. It's all good.
Which is why, a week later, when I walk into the class to see the paused opening credits of a movie, I sit down and relax. In my world, everything is captioned. The TV I watch at home has those friendly black lines scrolling at the bottom of the screen. I'm still on auto-pilot, eyes flickering to the bottom of the screen. The film begins rolling, and I hear garbled noises as a heavily accented actor delivers his lines. I look to you, wondering if you've simply forgotten. You see me trying to grab your attention, and apologize, saying there aren't any captions. I nod my head, but inwardly, I'm screaming. "WHAT about the IEP?! What about the Internet, all of those script sites? What about the e-mail address for my Teacher of the Deaf (TotD) I gave you, on the IEP recommendations sheet, who you're supposed to e-mail if the movie isn't captioned?! Was I speaking English!?" I sit, fuming for a while, trying to pick up random pieces of info. At the end of class, you assign an essay on the movie, due the next day. Ha! I think to myself.
Which is why you're surprised, the next day, when I hand nothing in. At the end of the class I approach you, reiterating everything about necessary captioning. You nod, agree, whatever.
The cycle begins.
Keeping in mind how often movies are watched at my school, this might happen twice a month. When the TotD approaches you, everything's good, I'm a good student, no, my hearing loss doesn't seem to be effecting me at all.
My parents, friends, and TotD know this to be untrue, however. You're simply resistant to my attempts to advocate, so I silently fume in your class during the rest of the semester.
Don't get me wrong, the IEP isn't evil. It can be downright helpful, but not in the ways I think it's meant to be. Something, for example, that isn't on my IEP, is group projects. I hate them. I hate them because I can be control freak-ish (that's me, overcompensating for my hearing loss. If I control the group direction, then I'll know what's going on), which leads to me doing a LOT of work. Which is OK, I will do my best for a good grade. But the IEP seems to signal to you that I'm hard of hearing. So, when I approach you, quietly, during class, and ask that our group be able to work in the hallway because with all the other groups talking, I can't hear the person sitting next to me, you allow us. We'll sit in the hallway and get stuff done. Hey! I can hear! But that IEP, yellow flag that it is, let's me ask this of you. It helps.
I had to ask myself why I wanted to write this a few times, during the process. I don't discourage anyone from getting an IEP, if it is appropriate for them. I just advise you that an IEP isn't a magical band-aid. It doesn't make hearing loss (in this situation) go away. It doesn't take it out of the equation at all. Advocacy is still very important, and if you're a teenager reading this, don't be afraid to shoot off an e-mail to your teacher, saying "Dear Mr. Teachy-mc-teacher, I can't deal when you don't do this and that. If you could do this-and-that, or perhaps hook me up with alternate whatever, I can deal. If you've got questions, feel free to hit me or my TotD up. TTYL, frustrated hoh/d student". If you're a parent of a hoh/d kid, don't be afraid to contact the teacher, and/or the totd. Trust me, your kid will thank you for it later, no matter how embarrassing it is at the time. The embarrassment might also teach some self-advocacy. And finally, if you're a teacher? Listen. It's not all your fault. Being hard of hearing/deaf (hoh/d) student is just half of the game. We need to be able to have open communication to make things work.
Quick MAJOR thank you to your fav blogger PinkLam (or MissPink, as I've seen it ;P) for letting me temporarily hijack her blog for a moment. Note that this post is not a reflection of her, or her opinions. She was kind enough to let me stick my nose in this whole hoh/d blogging :D Keep reading; I will.
So, you've accepted that your child has a hearing loss. Your kid is enrolled in school, and there's talk of an IEP. What can I tell you about your IEP? Not a lot that your audiologist, teacher, or teacher of the deaf can't tell you. I'm not an expert on IEPs. I've sat in on my own IEP meeting once, which, in my opinion, was horrible. It was the first one that I was asked to attend, and I basically sat there, missing class, while teachers, my mother, a school psychologist I had never met, a hearing teacher/psychologist I had met once before, informally, sat and spoke about me as if I wasn't there. I, if you can't tell, am not a fan of IEP's.
A quick background, however, so you know where I'm coming from. I'm a hard of hearing high school student. I wear hearing aids and use an FM system in class (for those uninitiated, the FM is a wireless microphone my teacher wears like a lanyard. There are small "boots" on my hearing aids that pick up the signal. This is supposed to give me the effect of the teacher speaking directly next to me), and I enjoy long walks on the beach (Not really, the sand/ocean "white noise"/ocean spray isn't great for hearing equipment).
The IEP is what, essentially, requires that my teachers wear my FM. It also explains where I should sit in the room, what conditions might be adverse to my learning [Read: bad lighting, uncarpeted rooms, large classes, heavy facial hair/accents], and what (if anything) additional I may require [FM use, captioned media, extra time on testing (I don't get that one either)]. "BUT!" I can *almost* hear you saying, "Isn't your IEP a lifesaver? Doesn't it mean you can relax, knowing you'll have unrestricted access to communication and information, just like everything else?! What a breakthrough!?" But the IEP is not this. Often, unless a teacher knows they will be meeting with my Teacher of the Deaf, they don't read my IEP. On the first day of school this year, I had one teacher ask if "the hearing aids are all, or do you have anything else going on?" What?! My TotD-provided printout, carefully hi-lited with the needs specific to each class, determined by a conversation about this very act of explanation... didn't cover this.
However, being a fairly confident teenager in my own right, I laugh it off, say no, briefly explain my FM (I'll already turn it on when I give it to you, if you need to, you can turn it off, here's how, I can also turn it off from my hearing aids, so if you forget it's fine. Just remember to turn it back on, or, if you for some reason take it off, to put it back on, so I don't have to awkwardly/embarrassingly interrupt the class, telling you I've been lost for the last 5 minutes because you forgot), and take a seat. You seem content. You reply, after a minute, to let me know if you can do anything, whatever. It's all good.
Which is why, a week later, when I walk into the class to see the paused opening credits of a movie, I sit down and relax. In my world, everything is captioned. The TV I watch at home has those friendly black lines scrolling at the bottom of the screen. I'm still on auto-pilot, eyes flickering to the bottom of the screen. The film begins rolling, and I hear garbled noises as a heavily accented actor delivers his lines. I look to you, wondering if you've simply forgotten. You see me trying to grab your attention, and apologize, saying there aren't any captions. I nod my head, but inwardly, I'm screaming. "WHAT about the IEP?! What about the Internet, all of those script sites? What about the e-mail address for my Teacher of the Deaf (TotD) I gave you, on the IEP recommendations sheet, who you're supposed to e-mail if the movie isn't captioned?! Was I speaking English!?" I sit, fuming for a while, trying to pick up random pieces of info. At the end of class, you assign an essay on the movie, due the next day. Ha! I think to myself.
Which is why you're surprised, the next day, when I hand nothing in. At the end of the class I approach you, reiterating everything about necessary captioning. You nod, agree, whatever.
The cycle begins.
Keeping in mind how often movies are watched at my school, this might happen twice a month. When the TotD approaches you, everything's good, I'm a good student, no, my hearing loss doesn't seem to be effecting me at all.
My parents, friends, and TotD know this to be untrue, however. You're simply resistant to my attempts to advocate, so I silently fume in your class during the rest of the semester.
Don't get me wrong, the IEP isn't evil. It can be downright helpful, but not in the ways I think it's meant to be. Something, for example, that isn't on my IEP, is group projects. I hate them. I hate them because I can be control freak-ish (that's me, overcompensating for my hearing loss. If I control the group direction, then I'll know what's going on), which leads to me doing a LOT of work. Which is OK, I will do my best for a good grade. But the IEP seems to signal to you that I'm hard of hearing. So, when I approach you, quietly, during class, and ask that our group be able to work in the hallway because with all the other groups talking, I can't hear the person sitting next to me, you allow us. We'll sit in the hallway and get stuff done. Hey! I can hear! But that IEP, yellow flag that it is, let's me ask this of you. It helps.
I had to ask myself why I wanted to write this a few times, during the process. I don't discourage anyone from getting an IEP, if it is appropriate for them. I just advise you that an IEP isn't a magical band-aid. It doesn't make hearing loss (in this situation) go away. It doesn't take it out of the equation at all. Advocacy is still very important, and if you're a teenager reading this, don't be afraid to shoot off an e-mail to your teacher, saying "Dear Mr. Teachy-mc-teacher, I can't deal when you don't do this and that. If you could do this-and-that, or perhaps hook me up with alternate whatever, I can deal. If you've got questions, feel free to hit me or my TotD up. TTYL, frustrated hoh/d student". If you're a parent of a hoh/d kid, don't be afraid to contact the teacher, and/or the totd. Trust me, your kid will thank you for it later, no matter how embarrassing it is at the time. The embarrassment might also teach some self-advocacy. And finally, if you're a teacher? Listen. It's not all your fault. Being hard of hearing/deaf (hoh/d) student is just half of the game. We need to be able to have open communication to make things work.
Quick MAJOR thank you to your fav blogger PinkLam (or MissPink, as I've seen it ;P) for letting me temporarily hijack her blog for a moment. Note that this post is not a reflection of her, or her opinions. She was kind enough to let me stick my nose in this whole hoh/d blogging :D Keep reading; I will.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Spreading Awareness- That's Just the Way We Hear
Many of you guys have probably heard about Mel Paticoff. She's the creator of HearingExchange Teens on Facebook and the author of Sophie's Tales, a cute little book about Sophie, a dog who has a cochlear implant. She has several family members with hearing loss and is currently studying deaf education. For last year's Better Hearing and Speech Month competition, she created a music video with her family called That's Just the Way We Hear. It was to the tune of the Jonas Brothers' That's Just the Way We Roll, and won first place in the contest! It even has captions, so that all of its viewers can fully enjoy it. Here is the video:
DoSomething.org is holding a Battle of the Bands competition to fight to keep music in schools. For this competition, Mel and the rest of her crew decided to remake the video. Here is some info about the video included on their Battle of the Bands site:
Why is music education important to you?
Music education is so important to us because it can make a HUGE difference in the lives of kids with hearing loss. If no one takes the time to introduce them to music, kids with hearing loss might not develop the same appreciation for music as hearing kids do, even with amazing cochlear implant and hearing aid technology. Yet, if they do learn to love music, it could improve their lives in a lot of ways! It will improve their auditory listening skills and social skills in big ways. We feel that this is definitely where music education money should be spent first...
Anything else we should know about your Battle of the Bands video project? We want you to know that our dream is to re-record the video with the Jonas Brothers. They have done a phenomenal job of raising awareness about different causes including diabetes, Down Syndrome, and "going green." We really hope they will consider adding hearing loss awareness to this list! It would be a dream come true to hear "That's Just the Way We Hear" played at one of their concerts, on JONAS, or on the Disney Channel. We also want to remind you to turn on the captioning! Unlike many videos found on YouTube, we took the time to make our video accessible to EVERYONE by adding captioning. Now everyone can understand our message loud and clear!
And here's the new video (also captioned)...
In order for the people in the video to achieve their goal, we need to vote for their video! It's very simple, just go to http://www.dosomething.org/bands/entry/sophies-tales and scroll to the bottom where it says "Login to rate this video." and click on it. If you don't already have an account, press "Create New Account" and come up with a user name and password. Once you do so, a confirmation email will be sent to you. After opening the link in the email, you will be able to rate the video at the bottom of the screen. Be sure to give it 10 guitars, and help Mel win the contest!
DoSomething.org is holding a Battle of the Bands competition to fight to keep music in schools. For this competition, Mel and the rest of her crew decided to remake the video. Here is some info about the video included on their Battle of the Bands site:
Why is music education important to you?
Music education is so important to us because it can make a HUGE difference in the lives of kids with hearing loss. If no one takes the time to introduce them to music, kids with hearing loss might not develop the same appreciation for music as hearing kids do, even with amazing cochlear implant and hearing aid technology. Yet, if they do learn to love music, it could improve their lives in a lot of ways! It will improve their auditory listening skills and social skills in big ways. We feel that this is definitely where music education money should be spent first...
Anything else we should know about your Battle of the Bands video project? We want you to know that our dream is to re-record the video with the Jonas Brothers. They have done a phenomenal job of raising awareness about different causes including diabetes, Down Syndrome, and "going green." We really hope they will consider adding hearing loss awareness to this list! It would be a dream come true to hear "That's Just the Way We Hear" played at one of their concerts, on JONAS, or on the Disney Channel. We also want to remind you to turn on the captioning! Unlike many videos found on YouTube, we took the time to make our video accessible to EVERYONE by adding captioning. Now everyone can understand our message loud and clear!
And here's the new video (also captioned)...
In order for the people in the video to achieve their goal, we need to vote for their video! It's very simple, just go to http://www.dosomething.org/bands/entry/sophies-tales and scroll to the bottom where it says "Login to rate this video." and click on it. If you don't already have an account, press "Create New Account" and come up with a user name and password. Once you do so, a confirmation email will be sent to you. After opening the link in the email, you will be able to rate the video at the bottom of the screen. Be sure to give it 10 guitars, and help Mel win the contest!
Friday, March 26, 2010
Perspectives
I can't help but occasionally wonder how big of a deal my hearing loss is for the people around me. Is it something that makes people act differently around me, or do most people not give it a second thought? This week I've gotten some insight on that, and thought I'd share.
A couple of days ago, we had (yet another) fire drill at school. The way they do fire drill at my school, is that regardless of what class the fire drill is in, you have to go and find your study hall class. Each class has a designated spot on the massive football field. However, I have absolutely no sense of direction, and when you're trying to find your way amongst 2,000 other teenagers, it can get pretty insane. So, with this last fire drill, I began wandering aimlessly around on the football field, hoping to see a familiar face. After doing this for a few minutes, I deemed the technique ineffective and decided to just stand in one spot, in hopes that I'd finally spot someone. No sooner had I stopped wandering than I saw one of my best friends (who is in my study hall) running up from behind me. "Hey, we're over there (points to area across the football field). I tried screaming your name, but then I realized that probably wasn't such a good idea..." (implying I probably wouldn't hear it)
While I don't want my hearing loss to be the first thing people think of, I'm glad it entered my friend's mind in that situation. Occasionally, when walking down the hall (which, between the blaring music and the obnoxious kids can create a deafening noise level) a friend will start talking to me as I'm concentrating on not dropping the 30 pounds of books I'm carrying. I don't always hear them speaking initially, and will occasionally be given annoyed looks when the end of their oh-so-important story is met with a blank, confused stare. They're pretty good about getting my attention first, but I guess it can sometimes be forgotten.
This year in my AP Human Geography class, I've befriended the girl who sits in front of me. It's the only class I've ever had with her, but we've grown close since we take a lot of the same classes and have some of the same interests. When she walked into the classroom today, she looks at the board and groaned. "Look at the second bullet on the board..." she said in an annoyed voice. I looked up to see that we were going to have a pop open-note quiz over the video we watched yesterday.
I began to laugh. She stared at me, confused, for a few seconds. Finally, it came to her and she screamed, "Ahh, no fair! I wish I had a hearing aid!" :P Someone else looked over, confused about why she would say such a thing.
"The video didn't have captions, so Mrs. B gave her a copy of her notes since she can't hear the video. She has all of the answers to the quiz!" Half the class then eyed me enviously, and I innocently shrugged. I was grateful that my teacher has finally gotten into the habit of giving me video notes.
Apparently no one took very good notes over the video. Our teacher loves giving quizzes over insanely specific (but pretty irrelevant) material. We got the quiz, and it only had ten questions, all of which were specific (some of the questions asked how much certain workers earned a day..what's the importance of that? The video was about China!) The sort of ironic thing was that a third of the answers weren't even in the teachers notes. (My teacher told me the answers to those.)
On a completely unrelated note, we had an orchestra competition today. All 3 levels of my school orchestra straight 1's (the best score) from all of the judges :)
A couple of days ago, we had (yet another) fire drill at school. The way they do fire drill at my school, is that regardless of what class the fire drill is in, you have to go and find your study hall class. Each class has a designated spot on the massive football field. However, I have absolutely no sense of direction, and when you're trying to find your way amongst 2,000 other teenagers, it can get pretty insane. So, with this last fire drill, I began wandering aimlessly around on the football field, hoping to see a familiar face. After doing this for a few minutes, I deemed the technique ineffective and decided to just stand in one spot, in hopes that I'd finally spot someone. No sooner had I stopped wandering than I saw one of my best friends (who is in my study hall) running up from behind me. "Hey, we're over there (points to area across the football field). I tried screaming your name, but then I realized that probably wasn't such a good idea..." (implying I probably wouldn't hear it)
While I don't want my hearing loss to be the first thing people think of, I'm glad it entered my friend's mind in that situation. Occasionally, when walking down the hall (which, between the blaring music and the obnoxious kids can create a deafening noise level) a friend will start talking to me as I'm concentrating on not dropping the 30 pounds of books I'm carrying. I don't always hear them speaking initially, and will occasionally be given annoyed looks when the end of their oh-so-important story is met with a blank, confused stare. They're pretty good about getting my attention first, but I guess it can sometimes be forgotten.
This year in my AP Human Geography class, I've befriended the girl who sits in front of me. It's the only class I've ever had with her, but we've grown close since we take a lot of the same classes and have some of the same interests. When she walked into the classroom today, she looks at the board and groaned. "Look at the second bullet on the board..." she said in an annoyed voice. I looked up to see that we were going to have a pop open-note quiz over the video we watched yesterday.
I began to laugh. She stared at me, confused, for a few seconds. Finally, it came to her and she screamed, "Ahh, no fair! I wish I had a hearing aid!" :P Someone else looked over, confused about why she would say such a thing.
"The video didn't have captions, so Mrs. B gave her a copy of her notes since she can't hear the video. She has all of the answers to the quiz!" Half the class then eyed me enviously, and I innocently shrugged. I was grateful that my teacher has finally gotten into the habit of giving me video notes.
Apparently no one took very good notes over the video. Our teacher loves giving quizzes over insanely specific (but pretty irrelevant) material. We got the quiz, and it only had ten questions, all of which were specific (some of the questions asked how much certain workers earned a day..what's the importance of that? The video was about China!) The sort of ironic thing was that a third of the answers weren't even in the teachers notes. (My teacher told me the answers to those.)
Monday, February 15, 2010
Unexpected Twist
The day came, and we were armed and ready. Both of my parents went to the meeting, which is a pretty big deal since usually it's jut me and my mom. My dad went around asking each person their name and job description, and there was a strong feeling of tension in the room. My dad, a lawyer, was being quite successful at being intimidating. That is, until he asked what an IEP is... Then everyone in the room started revealing their true selves, as they no longer saw him as much of a threat.
My parents began talking about the unfairness of the evaluation and handing out my audiologist's letter. My dad requested an independent evaluation.
"No. That's not necessary," said the lady who was mostly in charge of the evaluation So, apparently they can say no.. Guess we weren't expecting that to happen..
She then went on to say that in Special Education, in order to show a need for further services, you cannot be making any progress with the assistance/IEP currently in place. With the A's/high B's I currently have, that doesn't demonstrate that I'm failing to make progress.
"I have no doubt that you have to work much harder than everyone else, but that's just the way the law works."
My parents urged me to tell my story, from my point of view. (I'd already done it at every past meeting, but they wanted the people who performed the evaluation to get a better understanding of what I go through)
I told my story about how frustrated I was at the school. How I felt as if sometimes, I didn't even need to go to school because I missed so much of the discussion, it's worthless. That I didn't understand why they were fighting tooth and nail to prevent me from having something that could actually help me. I told them how tired I was. Tired of trying to keep up, tired of fighting- just tired. Sometime during those sentences, tears started streaming down my face. Ugh, I hate crying, especially in front of people I don't like. Yet, that's what happened at every single meeting ( I would then swear I'd never attend another one, only for the whole thing to start all over when there was another meeting.)
"Oh! I wish I'd known you were this frustrated when we'd done the evaluation. This changes everything." Everyone looked up at her...was she kidding?
"I had no idea this was taking such a toll on you and that you felt you needed it so much." Yeah. Because I just asked for CART because I thought it would be fun to fiddle around with...? (note sarcasm)
The lady then said that while I don't have an educational need, that she could put down that I have an emotional need and get me CART that way.
As, I'm sure you can imagine, that was the most bizarre 5 minutes of the meeting. Heck, that was the most bizarre 5 minutes of my life! Pretty sure this song started playing through my head..
(pause music at the bottom of the page)
Not so fast..
"But," she continued, "you'd still have to change schools."
Change schools? You see, they don't offer CART at my school, and aren't planning on it, no matter how much I beg/plead/cry. But, they do at another school that is about as far away as my current school from my house. This other school is a mainstream school, but it's smaller and has a fairly large deaf ed program. They send all the kids in need of CART or interpreting services there. Apparently it's cheaper/more efficient to have it all on one campus.
This meeting was halfway through the school year. I'd finally been adjusting to my new school. Now they wanted to toss me somewhere else? As much as I struggled at my current school, I have a great group of friends, and nice teachers. They just want me to walk away from all of that?
So, that leaves you where I am now. The decision making process. A little bit has happened since then (technology-wise), and I will post more on the pros and cons of each school.
But, for now, my wonderful reader, I leave you with that. I would really appreciate any more input you have, with regards to the current situation. What do you think...What would you do?
*I'm experimenting with my blog banner at the top. Still haven't been able to make anything I like, since I don't have any tools like Photoshop or InDesign at home. If anyone is generous, gifted in the design department, and would like to design something (for free) then it would be completely awesome!*
My parents began talking about the unfairness of the evaluation and handing out my audiologist's letter. My dad requested an independent evaluation.
"No. That's not necessary," said the lady who was mostly in charge of the evaluation So, apparently they can say no.. Guess we weren't expecting that to happen..
She then went on to say that in Special Education, in order to show a need for further services, you cannot be making any progress with the assistance/IEP currently in place. With the A's/high B's I currently have, that doesn't demonstrate that I'm failing to make progress.
"I have no doubt that you have to work much harder than everyone else, but that's just the way the law works."
My parents urged me to tell my story, from my point of view. (I'd already done it at every past meeting, but they wanted the people who performed the evaluation to get a better understanding of what I go through)
I told my story about how frustrated I was at the school. How I felt as if sometimes, I didn't even need to go to school because I missed so much of the discussion, it's worthless. That I didn't understand why they were fighting tooth and nail to prevent me from having something that could actually help me. I told them how tired I was. Tired of trying to keep up, tired of fighting- just tired. Sometime during those sentences, tears started streaming down my face. Ugh, I hate crying, especially in front of people I don't like. Yet, that's what happened at every single meeting ( I would then swear I'd never attend another one, only for the whole thing to start all over when there was another meeting.)
"Oh! I wish I'd known you were this frustrated when we'd done the evaluation. This changes everything." Everyone looked up at her...was she kidding?
"I had no idea this was taking such a toll on you and that you felt you needed it so much." Yeah. Because I just asked for CART because I thought it would be fun to fiddle around with...? (note sarcasm)
The lady then said that while I don't have an educational need, that she could put down that I have an emotional need and get me CART that way.
As, I'm sure you can imagine, that was the most bizarre 5 minutes of the meeting. Heck, that was the most bizarre 5 minutes of my life! Pretty sure this song started playing through my head..
(pause music at the bottom of the page)
Not so fast..
"But," she continued, "you'd still have to change schools."
Change schools? You see, they don't offer CART at my school, and aren't planning on it, no matter how much I beg/plead/cry. But, they do at another school that is about as far away as my current school from my house. This other school is a mainstream school, but it's smaller and has a fairly large deaf ed program. They send all the kids in need of CART or interpreting services there. Apparently it's cheaper/more efficient to have it all on one campus.
This meeting was halfway through the school year. I'd finally been adjusting to my new school. Now they wanted to toss me somewhere else? As much as I struggled at my current school, I have a great group of friends, and nice teachers. They just want me to walk away from all of that?
So, that leaves you where I am now. The decision making process. A little bit has happened since then (technology-wise), and I will post more on the pros and cons of each school.
But, for now, my wonderful reader, I leave you with that. I would really appreciate any more input you have, with regards to the current situation. What do you think...What would you do?
*I'm experimenting with my blog banner at the top. Still haven't been able to make anything I like, since I don't have any tools like Photoshop or InDesign at home. If anyone is generous, gifted in the design department, and would like to design something (for free) then it would be completely awesome!*
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Preparing for Battle- High School part 3
Before having a meeting, my parents wanted to make sure we knew what our rights were, and that nothing (else) would be unfair. Oftentimes on blogs, when I see parents talk about their kids struggling (often because the kids themselves haven't been around enough kids with hearing loss, so they feel "different,") I recommend AG Bell. Join, I say. Go to a convention, it will be a tremendous help for both parents and children. It's not because I'm some crazy die-hard oralist with an agenda (and really, most of the people in it aren't either!) It's because AG Bell has been such a help through all of this- both parens of people I met who have been through it before, as well as a lawyer who belongs. For almost no pay, they've helped us tremendously and given direction when we had no clue where we were going. Not to mention the conventions are tons of fun, and if you would like to see my smiling face, then come to Orlando!
From the lawyer's perspective, he told us it would be really difficult to win any sort of lawsuit based on educational need. Apparently, there was once a very big court case similar to mine, and the school district won. Plus, we don't really want to go the legal route- it's messy, expensive, and would just waste more time. Like Kim said, they had broken the law from a civil rights perspective.Not so much for the denial of CART, but for the ridiculous evaluation and the fact they provided almost none of the previous accomodations (captions, video notes) until it was months into the school year. He also said we had a right to an independent evaluation, and to request one. We planned to go into the meeting and request it.
My audiologist was also quite angry about the report, and thought it would do some good to have a hearing test to prove that I have trouble hearing in a classroom environment. I think this was some sort of newer test- not any of that HINT stuff with annoying white noise. This test had both male and female speakers (with extrememly random sentences) and the backgroumd noise was actual people speaking, as you would find in the real world (a classroom). With my concentration solely on listening (not on comprehend/understanding, or writing things down) I made somewhere around 75%. Apparently it's a pretty difficult test and most CI users score significantly lower than that, but it was still pretty telling. Most people with average hearing score 100% on the test, without having to put so much effort into it. Don't you think it would make a huge difference if you missed a fourth of everything said in the classroom? My audiologist thought so too, and wrote a letter to the evaluators that we brought to the meeting.
Wow, I'm just dragging this out aren't I? Promise, the next post will be about the actual meeting!
From the lawyer's perspective, he told us it would be really difficult to win any sort of lawsuit based on educational need. Apparently, there was once a very big court case similar to mine, and the school district won. Plus, we don't really want to go the legal route- it's messy, expensive, and would just waste more time. Like Kim said, they had broken the law from a civil rights perspective.Not so much for the denial of CART, but for the ridiculous evaluation and the fact they provided almost none of the previous accomodations (captions, video notes) until it was months into the school year. He also said we had a right to an independent evaluation, and to request one. We planned to go into the meeting and request it.
My audiologist was also quite angry about the report, and thought it would do some good to have a hearing test to prove that I have trouble hearing in a classroom environment. I think this was some sort of newer test- not any of that HINT stuff with annoying white noise. This test had both male and female speakers (with extrememly random sentences) and the backgroumd noise was actual people speaking, as you would find in the real world (a classroom). With my concentration solely on listening (not on comprehend/understanding, or writing things down) I made somewhere around 75%. Apparently it's a pretty difficult test and most CI users score significantly lower than that, but it was still pretty telling. Most people with average hearing score 100% on the test, without having to put so much effort into it. Don't you think it would make a huge difference if you missed a fourth of everything said in the classroom? My audiologist thought so too, and wrote a letter to the evaluators that we brought to the meeting.
Wow, I'm just dragging this out aren't I? Promise, the next post will be about the actual meeting!
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