Signs

Now that our Duke adventure is behind us, you may well be asking yourself... what next? Well, this is it!

As you can see, Noa has a bunch of signs and she loves to "talk" with just about anybody who can follow her directions. While she has not really made progress as a speaker, she has made great progress - and shown great enthusiasm, as a communicator and our next goal is to get her some support around this. Noa is very eager to communicate and we know she could be doing more... (photo to the right: hat & shoe)

Here is the catch... she isn't deaf. Why is that a catch? Because the Board of Ed wants proof that she is deaf in order to provide signing services. We've run into this problem before. And no matter how many times I explain it to her, Noa stubbornly refuses to pretend to be deaf!

I've tried telling people that it's an auditory processing disorder but again, that stubborn Noa refuses to pretend that she doesn't understand what we're saying. Can you believe that girl?!?!

What is really strange to me about the whole thing is this assumption that being able to hear means that one is able to speak. Not only is it a strange assumption - it's just plain wrong. For Noa the processing difficulty isn't in hearing language, it is in putting together sounds to create words, and it seems to me that if there were ANY doubt about that it could be solved by just spending some time with Noa and seeing all the signs that she has; she obviously has a lot to say, and is more than ready to say it!

I'm would have included more signs, but I'm finding that posting numerous photos in one post and having them show up where I want them to be is... vexing.