Contents

1. Introduction
2. Hearing aids
3. Talking with your baby
4. Who does what?
5. Hearing screening for babies
6. What's in a word
7. Sources of information

3. Talking with your baby

The whole point of having hearing aids — and keeping them working to their best effect — is so that your baby can hear. But there’s a difference between hearing and listening. Hearing is what we do when the television is playing in the background —we know there’s talk and possibly who’s talking on what programme (because we’ve listened to it before) but probably couldn’t repeat the last sentence that’s been said. Listening is when we pay attention to what we are hearing and focus on it, making sense of what we hear and thinking about it.

Helping your baby to listen is part of what every parent does, without even thinking about it. We naturally use a different style of talk with babies, lots of repetition, nonsensical noises, lilting voice and rhythm, exaggerated facial expressions. All of these work to attract the baby’s attention — to get them listening rather than just hearing. Most babies respond even before they start to make noises; they wave their arms around, make faces — or smile! —back. It’s usually clear that adult and baby are having a conversation — even if neither are too sure what it’s about! Once babies are listening and responding like this, then they gradually begin to make sense of what they hear and start to experiment with noises themselves. The more they listen as they grow, the more they understand and the more they babble and then talk.

The trouble is that, sometimes, once people have been told a baby has a hearing loss they don’t think it’s the right tiling to do to communicate like this. But a baby with a hearing aid is still not hearing as children without a hearing loss do; the sounds are less distinct and that makes it more difficult to distinguish between one sound and another. So they need more, not less, chances to learn what it’s all a bout.

So talking with a deaf baby is like talking with any baby — and for most of us it comes naturally but there are a few pointers (useful for any baby):

• Get up close at first. Babies like to see as well as hear and your facial expressions help to emphasise the message you’re giving.
• Use eye-to-eye contact. Babies use their eyes to give messages like we do. They will look at a toy and you will say “Oh, do you want your teddy?” giving them the words that link to what they’re focussed on.
• Talk about lots of things. Your voice communicates your feelings — long before baby understands the words — and lets her know you want to chat and that this is important for both of you. This aids bonding as well as communication.
• Don’t worry what you are talking about. It will probably he about feeding and changing and everyday routines — exactly what babies need to hear. Hearing the words which are about what they are experiencing at that precise moment is how all babies gradually come to understand what the words mean. So all that chat about "do you want..., are you hungry..., isn't this a nice bath?" is never wasted. Talking about the same things every day isn’t boring for the baby — and it becomes automatic and not really boring for you! The repetition helps understanding and develops a feeling of security. We don’t really expect him to understand everything he means when he tries to communicate. Practice makes perfect.
• Don’t talk continuously. I cave spaces to suggest that it is her turn, to let 11cr know you expect a response. You might need to leave a little extra time for the baby to receive and think about the sound. Respond to his response whether it uses his voice or just his face or body — let him know that you like what he’s done — whether it’s a noise or a movement.
• Try singing rhymes, silly songs or whatever songs you like currently. it will be rhythmic and tuneful (or tuneful enough!) and just the sort of sounds babies like to listen to. It can be any song that you enjoy. But later it is useful to introduce nursery rhymes, action rhymes and traditional children’s songs.

What’s special about talking with a deaf baby?

• Hearing aids pick up the sound closest to them best of all. As your baby is young you are likely to he cuddling her, picking her up and generally being very close to that microphone so you will he giving her lots of interesting speech sounds through the aids.
• Being at home is usually quieter than elsewhere because of the carpets and furniture absorbing noise. But it is especially difficult for a deaf baby learning to use the hearing aids and to listen when there’s lots of competing background noise — like the TV, radio or washing machine — so make sure that some of your chatting time is in a quiet place.
• Remember you don’t need to shout, just use normal voice levels as the hearing aids will make the sound louder. Use the tuneful, “more rhythmic” voice that we all naturally use when we chat to any baby.
• Other members of the family, friends and childminders need to understand all this too. Their different voices are useful ill helping the baby’s listening skills develop.

So keep those hearing aids up to scratch and chat away together.

Most babies take about a year to learn to listen and respond with their voices — as opposed to making random noises. Your deaf baby may take a little longer but, with the best help the hearing aid can give, thanks to your maintenance of it, you should soon he having ‘conversations’ together.

next section: 4. Who does what?