MUFULIRA COLLEGE OF EDUCATION

Special Education Year One

Hearing impairment
Specific outcomes
- discuss hearing impairment
- determine the intervention measures for each impairment
DEFINITION
Hearing impairments deafness or hearing loss refers to total or partial inability to
hear sounds.
Hearing loss is a reduced ability to hear sounds in the same way as other people.
Hearing loss is manifested in two ways; either one is completely deaf or has some
residue hearing. The word deaf means profound or completely inability to hear. Hard
hearing refers to partial hearing loss the complete inability to hear sound is called
deafness. Deafness maybe prelingual or post lingual.
Deafness- this occurs when a person cannot understand speech through
hearing, even when sound is amplified. Profound deafness: this refers to a
total lack of hearing. an individual with profound deafness is unable to detect
sound at all.
The severity of hearing impairment is categorised by how much lounder volumes
need to be set at before they can detect a sound.
CAUSES OF HEARING IMPAIRMENT
Some common causes of hearing loss in children
During pregnancy and around the time of birth a number of ear potentially hazardous
events may occur, some of which re associated with subsequent hearing loss in the
infant. In early life, the infants is exposed to a variety of influences which may impair
hearing. If the foetus or young infant is exposed to those factors are traditionally
described under three headings.
Pre-natal factors
i) biological causes
A disease attacking the child through the mother causing malformation of the ear.
Heredity due to abnormality in the genes from the parents of the parents and distant
relative.
ii) Pathological
Here the cause s are diseases attacking the fetus during the growth period of the
ear which range from 3-4 months of pregnancy and may be due to
- virus infection of German measles
Syphilis
- virus infections of influenza if not treated clinically can lead to the child being
born deaf.
All diseases must be treated at the clinic to avoid transmission of the disease.
- drugs for terminating pregnancy.
- Arthrits
some cancers
Teenager exposed to second hand stroke

Peri-natal
- blood incompatibility of the parents known as rhesus factor (RF factor) may
cause severe jaundice and damage to the nerve tissue.
- difficulty in labour leading to blueness of the baby
- prolonged labour leading for baby known as anoxia or asphyxia.
- forceps delivery using tools that may injure the baby causing deafness in the
process.
Post-natal
Secretary otitis, media
- meningitis or inflammation of the brain stem due to infections
- treatments for tuberclosis
- Influenza infection, tuberculosis infections, mumps, infections of the middle ear
connected to the back of the nose by the eustachian tube which acts as passage
for the disease leading to the middle ear.
- measles, scarlet fever – serious and easily transmitted painful sore throats
accompanied with red spots, whooping cough, chicken pox
- blockage of eustachian tube by adenoids are of the causes, namely secretary
otitis media. not only is it very common in children in all ages. It is characterised
by the formation of thick mucus or the fluid in the middle ear. The cause is
unknown but defective ventilation of the middle ear is probably an important
predisposing factor. fluctuating hearing loss, earache, disturbance, fretfulness
frustrating, distressing the presence of loud noise. Tinnitus and difficulties with
accurate discrimination of speech are common events in children with secretary
otitis media.

TYPES OF HEARING LOSS

There are three different types of hearing loss
1. conductive hearing loss
this means that vibrations are not passing through from the outer ear to the
inner ear, specifically the cochlea. This type can occur for many reasons,
including:
n excessive build up of earwax, glue ear, an infection with inflammation and
fluid buildup, a perforated eardrum, malfunction of the ossiles, a defective
eardrum
ear infections can leave a scar tissue, which might reduce eardrum function,
the ossicles may become impaired as a result of infection, trauma or fusing
together.

2. Sensorineural hearing loss

Hearing loss is cause by dyfunction of the inner ear, the cochlea, auditory
nerve or brain damage.
This kind of hearing loss is normally due to damaged hair cells in the cochlea.
As humans grow older hair cells lose some of their function and hearing
deteriorates.
Long time exposure to loud noises, especilly high frequency sounds , is
another common reason for hair cell damage. Damaged hair cells cannot be
replaced. Sensorineural total deafness may occur as a result of congenital
deformities, inner ear infection, or head trauma.
3. Mixed hearing loss
This is combined of conductive and sensorineural hearing loss. Long term ear
infections can damage both the ear drum and the ossicles, sometime surgical
interventions may restore hearing, but it is not always affective.

Hearing can affect speech ability depending on what occurs.

Prelingual deafness.
This is an inability to fully or partially hear before learning how to utter or
understanding speech. An individual with pre-lingual deafness was born with
congenital deformity or will have lost hearing during infancy.
*In majority of cases, people with prelingual deafness have hearing parents
and siblings, many are also born in families who did not already know sign
language. They consequently also tend to have slow language development.
The few who were born into signing families tend not to face delays in
language development.
* if children with pre-lingual deafness are given cochlear implants before the
ag of 4 year, they can acquire oral language successfully.
* become socially isolated- due to lack of people around not fluent with sign
language.
Post- lingual deafness
Most people with hearing loss have psot lingual deafness. They acquired
spoken language before hearing was dimished. A medication side effect,
trauma, infection, or disease may cause losing their sense of hearing.
  Depending on the severity of hearing loss, the individual may have had to
use hearing aids, receive a cochlear implant, or learn how to lip read.
 Challenges feeling of isolation and depression and aloneness.

Classification of hearing impairment

Prelingual one becomes deaf before acquiring speech or language it is genetic or
arises from induced injuries or intra uterine infection during the prenatal period. Post
lingual comes after acquiring speech or language.
An instrument called pure-tone audiometer is used to measure hearing acuity. The
audiometric evaluation assists in determining the extent and type of hearing loss so
that the proper remedial and medical steps may be taken. The severity of the
hearing impairment is ranked according to the loudness (measured in decibels (db))
a sound must be before being detected by an individual.
Normal (-10 to 15 ) db
Slight (16 to 25 )db
Mild (26 to 40) db
Moderate (41 to 55)db
Moderately sever (56 to 70) db also called hard hearing
Severe (71 to 90) db
Profound (91+ db
Identification of children with hearing impairment
- Behavioural indicators
Lack of attention
Lack of speech development
Difficulty in following instructions
Dependence on classmates for instructions
Turning or cocking of head
Acting, stubborn, shy or withdraw behaviour
Medical indicators
- Frequent ear aches
- Fluid running from the ears
- Frequent colds and sore throats
- Recurring tonsillitis
Methods and strategies used for teaching the hearing impaired
- Modes of communication – while listening and speaking remain the preferred
methods of communication for students with mild and moderate degrees of
impairments, for those who are severely to profound deaf, alternative methods
may be needed. These methods include gesture, sign language, cued speech
and finger spelling.
- Sign language- in sign language; shape location, movement patterns of
hands, intensity, and signers, facial expression all communication meaning
and content.
- Finger spelling
Finger spelling is also called manual alphabet. Various finger spelling
represents individual letters of the alphabet used to spell out words. it consists
of 26 distinct hand positions. It is used with other methods of teaching e.g sign
language and oralism. It is a form of manual communication that assigns to
each letter of the alphabet as a sign.
- Total communication- combines manual and oral methods according to ability
needs and interests. This method teaches the students to be skilled in
gestures, lip reading, finger spelling and one of several English- based sign
language known as collectively as Manually Coded English (MCE).
- Oral communication
In this speech or oral – only approach, children are taught to use as much of
-their residual hearing as possible. This method was the most popular until the
1970s but a few programs still use it.
Speech-read (lip reading and how to speak. The oral approach does not allow
children to use any form of manual communication such as finger spelling or
signing. In fact, even natural signing, such as gestures, is discouraged.
Individuals who are deaf must live and work in a world where most people
hear normally and communicate through oral expression. They believe that,
individuals who are deaf should learn to communicate as the majority does so
that they can become part of the mainstream society.