Lately, we have singer in the house, none ever than the cute Fakhri.
I was quite surprised now that he is really into tunes. He started with the song "Naik-naik ke puncak gunung", which proven to help him alot differentiating right from left as one of the lyrics says "Kiri ... kanan...kulihat saja ... banyak pohon cemara..."
His second attempt is "Topi saya bundar" and "Burung Kakaktua" all at the same time, cause the tune is very much alike, only the lyrics different. You know what ? He ended up singing:
"Topi saya bundar... Hinggap di Jendela.... Nenek sudah Tua... Giginya tinggal Satu"
Hahahaha... The worst of it... he did that in purpose.... That's his hobby lately, changing the lyrics just as he wish....
I'll post his singing.. I promise !!
Monday, March 31, 2008
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Moment of Truth
Hi.. it's been a while.
These past 3 months I have been very busy finding the appropriate school for Fakhri. It was tiring, and just like doing a shopping - you have to do some window shopping, compare one school from another, and apply for the seat-in test.
Seat in test ? Yes... as early as pre-K, children here in Indonesia are required to go through seat-in test (a.k.a adaptation test with the school surroundings), and physicologic test. As young as 3 years, our children has been categorised as "slow learner, average, better than average, or superior".
So after comparing several good islamic school, me and husband enrolled Fakhri to 2 private school. These are normal school, not school for the deaf. In the first school, whilst Fakhri is being test the parents have an interview session with the school principal. Directly we describe Fakhri situation, and ask whether the school can accept it and willing to cooperate with us to educate Fakhri. The first school come back to us with positive comments, however they are not certain if the school foundation will except children with dissabilities like Fakhri. If you can imagine how do we feels about that statement. But then when we see Fakhri can answer all the interviewer questions, we are very glad and confident Fakhri is going to pass the test.
In the second school, the was no interview with the parents, but Fakhri went into 2 kind of test, including one that asking numbers, colours, family tree, and some physical test e.g walking following a straight line. Again, Fakhri proof up to be 'normal' just like any other kids. We were very happy to see he was very confident to enter the class without us, only with the teacher. We were even happier when we see that the interviewer/teachers can converse with Fakhri naturally - we were very worried that only us at home understand Fakhri's. None of our worries have materialised.
And... as I requested in my late night prayers ... God gives his blessings to us. Fakhri was accepted to both favourite school !
One of the test results even mentioned that Fakhri's potential IQ is above average, meaning he is categorised as clever!
Alhamdulillah.... Our hard work at home with the therapist and private teachers, with the nanny, preparing Fakhri for school are paid off. Allahu Akbar.... God are the Greatest !!
These past 3 months I have been very busy finding the appropriate school for Fakhri. It was tiring, and just like doing a shopping - you have to do some window shopping, compare one school from another, and apply for the seat-in test.
Seat in test ? Yes... as early as pre-K, children here in Indonesia are required to go through seat-in test (a.k.a adaptation test with the school surroundings), and physicologic test. As young as 3 years, our children has been categorised as "slow learner, average, better than average, or superior".
So after comparing several good islamic school, me and husband enrolled Fakhri to 2 private school. These are normal school, not school for the deaf. In the first school, whilst Fakhri is being test the parents have an interview session with the school principal. Directly we describe Fakhri situation, and ask whether the school can accept it and willing to cooperate with us to educate Fakhri. The first school come back to us with positive comments, however they are not certain if the school foundation will except children with dissabilities like Fakhri. If you can imagine how do we feels about that statement. But then when we see Fakhri can answer all the interviewer questions, we are very glad and confident Fakhri is going to pass the test.
In the second school, the was no interview with the parents, but Fakhri went into 2 kind of test, including one that asking numbers, colours, family tree, and some physical test e.g walking following a straight line. Again, Fakhri proof up to be 'normal' just like any other kids. We were very happy to see he was very confident to enter the class without us, only with the teacher. We were even happier when we see that the interviewer/teachers can converse with Fakhri naturally - we were very worried that only us at home understand Fakhri's. None of our worries have materialised.
And... as I requested in my late night prayers ... God gives his blessings to us. Fakhri was accepted to both favourite school !
One of the test results even mentioned that Fakhri's potential IQ is above average, meaning he is categorised as clever!
Alhamdulillah.... Our hard work at home with the therapist and private teachers, with the nanny, preparing Fakhri for school are paid off. Allahu Akbar.... God are the Greatest !!
Monday, September 10, 2007
Fakhri's 2nd Birthday
Today is Fakhri's 2nd Birthday, and his first year anniversary of hearing via cochlear implant device.
If we look back, precisely this time one year ago we were not sure whether we have make the right decision to implant Fakhri. And it proves out it was the best decision we ever made about Fakhri's future as we want him to become part of 'hearing & talking community'. We can understand if other parents are reluctant to do the implant, recognising the risks it carries and the fact that about 5% of recipients do not show any hearing improvements. However, we do encourage some of our friends who came to us and asks our opinions about cochlear implant to find out more about cochlear implant and that the benefit (of the implant) outweigh the risks, especially for those with children that are diagnosed with profound hearing loss.
But then implant without a persistent AV Therapy at home is nothing. I am so grateful that God smoothes the path for us, my company has been very supportive in giving me more time with Fakhri and to work flexibly from home, and we have hired the best nanny for Fakhri. Her name is Reni and he started directly when Fakhri came from Singapore (after his implant). Reni is very talkative and very passionate about applying AVT to Fakhri's everyday activity. She also proves up to be smart and can learn the principle of AVT I taught her. She always come with us to Fakhri's AVT session, and she usually gets nervous whenever the Therapist did some tests to check Fakhri's progress. The picture here shows Fakhri and his nanny (the one with headscarf).
I promised to post Fakhri's talk, I have not had chance to record him. Fakhri now has started to sing, and say 2 or 3 words in a sentence, We are all very excited........
Sunday, May 06, 2007
New Words
It seems that every week Fakhri says a new word !
This week he starts saying "uuka" for "buka" (open), "cak" for "cicak" (some kind of small lizards that eats mosquitoes), "mamak" for "sama" (same), "mamah" when he is calling me, "ade" for little baby, "Ngak" for "Nggak" (no) and "Mau" for "I want that"
I'd like to put him on recording... to share with you all his progress. Let me find out how I can do that first...and i surely will post it !
This week he starts saying "uuka" for "buka" (open), "cak" for "cicak" (some kind of small lizards that eats mosquitoes), "mamak" for "sama" (same), "mamah" when he is calling me, "ade" for little baby, "Ngak" for "Nggak" (no) and "Mau" for "I want that"
I'd like to put him on recording... to share with you all his progress. Let me find out how I can do that first...and i surely will post it !
Saturday, April 28, 2007
First Words......
Hi everyone... it's been a while that I have not put news about Fakhri in this blog. It was quite a crazy busy life for me to juggle between works, business travelling, fakhri's therapy, and dealing with his older brother jealousy.
If we count from his first switch on, it has been 6 months Fakhri has access to his hearings (with his CI implant). His receptive language is developing very fast. He can now identify the toy by its name that includes train, cars, aeroplanes, bus, and all sorts of farm and wild animals (horse, cow, sheep, elephant, lion, snake, monkey), etc. He starts imitating the sound of each toys as he learned it through his AVT session e.g the cars goes "brrrmmmm" ... the monkey goes "e..e...e", etc. Most of time he name his toys with this sounds.
Fakhri also has develop some skill on imitating on demand. He starts imitating 6 ling sounds, he can do all 6, but his "u" sounds more like "mmm". His therapist says this is quite normal that some implanted kids perceived 'u' with 'm', and I read that along the time the kids can pronounce it correctly and not every kid has the same difficulty. Some has difficulty in pronouncing 'k' which is not the case with Fakhri. In addition, his 'sh' seems similar with 'sss'.
Just 3 weeks ago our family went to Pekanbaru in Riau Province to visit my younger sister who just delivered a baby girl - the first granddaughter for my parents. Fakhri was so excited. He talked/bables a lot! I have heard several times for the past couple of weeks Fakhri yell out my name as ...."Mah...." but in Pekanbaru he starts saying "Pak...Pak..." (Bapak = Father), and "Amang".... (Abang = Brother), "Ade" (kid/baby).
It seems that Fakhri is in the stage of labelling people (attaching face with name). It provides some sort of achievements when he calls out the person name like the above and the person gives response back.
His challenge is now in saying "u", for example if he says "bunga" (=flower), he says it (mmnga)... when he says "buka" (=open) he says "mmka". Also there are some words that he pronounced not really similar to what it sounds. And not everyone understands what he is trying to say at this moment, but we think it all takes time.
Our next target: Introducing Primary Colours.... Opposites adjectives..... (in and out, forward and backward, up and down, etc), and pick 2 toys out of 3 and put it in identified box.
If we count from his first switch on, it has been 6 months Fakhri has access to his hearings (with his CI implant). His receptive language is developing very fast. He can now identify the toy by its name that includes train, cars, aeroplanes, bus, and all sorts of farm and wild animals (horse, cow, sheep, elephant, lion, snake, monkey), etc. He starts imitating the sound of each toys as he learned it through his AVT session e.g the cars goes "brrrmmmm" ... the monkey goes "e..e...e", etc. Most of time he name his toys with this sounds.
Fakhri also has develop some skill on imitating on demand. He starts imitating 6 ling sounds, he can do all 6, but his "u" sounds more like "mmm". His therapist says this is quite normal that some implanted kids perceived 'u' with 'm', and I read that along the time the kids can pronounce it correctly and not every kid has the same difficulty. Some has difficulty in pronouncing 'k' which is not the case with Fakhri. In addition, his 'sh' seems similar with 'sss'.
Just 3 weeks ago our family went to Pekanbaru in Riau Province to visit my younger sister who just delivered a baby girl - the first granddaughter for my parents. Fakhri was so excited. He talked/bables a lot! I have heard several times for the past couple of weeks Fakhri yell out my name as ...."Mah...." but in Pekanbaru he starts saying "Pak...Pak..." (Bapak = Father), and "Amang".... (Abang = Brother), "Ade" (kid/baby).
It seems that Fakhri is in the stage of labelling people (attaching face with name). It provides some sort of achievements when he calls out the person name like the above and the person gives response back.
His challenge is now in saying "u", for example if he says "bunga" (=flower), he says it (mmnga)... when he says "buka" (=open) he says "mmka". Also there are some words that he pronounced not really similar to what it sounds. And not everyone understands what he is trying to say at this moment, but we think it all takes time.
Our next target: Introducing Primary Colours.... Opposites adjectives..... (in and out, forward and backward, up and down, etc), and pick 2 toys out of 3 and put it in identified box.
Sunday, December 10, 2006
10 Tips for successful AVT Therapy at home
Below are 10 Tips from Mrs Gowry - the distinguished wife of Singapore Ambassador for Indonesia on how to do a successful home therapy for your hearing impaired child.
1. Teach Reading Early
Even when your child is very young, there is nothing wrong with 'labelling' your furnitures e.g bed, refrigerator, etc. Try to use single words and not phrases under all pictures for younger age children. Read to your child every day.....
2. Teach, don't test
Talk the whole phrases, not only single words. Try create a 'play' with the animal toys (in the barn, in the forest, etc) with different sounds. In your therapy time, speak 1 minute about anything that your child would like to hear.... to exercise his/her listening skill. Children would now if they are being tested so the minute you sense your child lost his cooperation it may be time to switch the approach - play time... without testing... learn new vocab..play drama... without testing.
3. Make it fun
Be creative, make therapy a fun session with new things, use water, food colourings, matches (only when you are around) and candles, play doh, cards. Do things that new to your child to attract his attention. If possible involve siblings to put their ideas for a fun therapy session !
4. Music is essentials
Teach nursery rhymes - use/make cards for each phrases of the song - to put meaning to the sounds, then ask your child to take each related cards after you finish singing that paragraph. Introduce music instruments e.g piano after your child can understand simple instruction e.g around 6-7 years.
5. Set Goals
Set yearly, monthly, weekly and daily goals. Set a higher goal for hearing impaired child than for normal child. Plan ahead daily what specific objective you want to achieve and how would you do it (what's the game, the tools, etc).
6. Wait...wait...wait
Give 3 times to the hearing impaired child before you help him/her. Let him ask for someone to repeat his sentence until 3 times before you help him. Give him 3 chances to speak before you jump in and speak for him.
7. Make Live Hard
Put your child out of their comfort zone e.g change their routine such that they try to fix it up by producing the words e.g asking for the right utensils to eat (spoons), asking for the right pair of socks, etc.
8. Give Confidence
Your child would be different from normal child, but you have to try to minimize him feeling different so that he can be confidence of himself e.g tuck in his implant processor under his shirts, choose the correct colour for the coil to match his hair colour, etc. It is also important to share your view different people needs different things, some needs eyeglasses, some needs braces, and some needs cochlea implant/hearing aids. Let your child order Mc Donalds by themselves...
9. Put aside extra time to communicate
Sometimes with busy schedule either it's work, minding house chores, taking the other siblings to school, etc. you take communication for granted. You talk while you walk, you mumble a lot, that's not enough for your hearing impaired child, especially for the young ones. It is advisable that you set aside an extra time to communicate one on one with him/her. You can talk about your day at work, or ask about his day at nursery/school/home. Also you can talk to prepare him for somethings that new to him, e.g going to supermarket or going down to a friends house. Talk to him about what to expect and what people usually do in that kind of new situations. This way your hearing impaired child does not feel awkward with the new situation.
10. Support from the whole family
If you come from big family - as you would if you origins from Indonesia - spend some time with your big family of how they can support the hearing impaired child. Support can mean sticking to one language at home (to avoid confusion and quicker language imersion for the hearing impaired child), or actively play a role to support AVT therapy principles at home. If you are the only one that practising AVT at home while the other family member (grandpa/grandma, nanny, sibblings) do not even know what AVT is then it is something that you have to work on.
1. Teach Reading Early
Even when your child is very young, there is nothing wrong with 'labelling' your furnitures e.g bed, refrigerator, etc. Try to use single words and not phrases under all pictures for younger age children. Read to your child every day.....
2. Teach, don't test
Talk the whole phrases, not only single words. Try create a 'play' with the animal toys (in the barn, in the forest, etc) with different sounds. In your therapy time, speak 1 minute about anything that your child would like to hear.... to exercise his/her listening skill. Children would now if they are being tested so the minute you sense your child lost his cooperation it may be time to switch the approach - play time... without testing... learn new vocab..play drama... without testing.
3. Make it fun
Be creative, make therapy a fun session with new things, use water, food colourings, matches (only when you are around) and candles, play doh, cards. Do things that new to your child to attract his attention. If possible involve siblings to put their ideas for a fun therapy session !
4. Music is essentials
Teach nursery rhymes - use/make cards for each phrases of the song - to put meaning to the sounds, then ask your child to take each related cards after you finish singing that paragraph. Introduce music instruments e.g piano after your child can understand simple instruction e.g around 6-7 years.
5. Set Goals
Set yearly, monthly, weekly and daily goals. Set a higher goal for hearing impaired child than for normal child. Plan ahead daily what specific objective you want to achieve and how would you do it (what's the game, the tools, etc).
6. Wait...wait...wait
Give 3 times to the hearing impaired child before you help him/her. Let him ask for someone to repeat his sentence until 3 times before you help him. Give him 3 chances to speak before you jump in and speak for him.
7. Make Live Hard
Put your child out of their comfort zone e.g change their routine such that they try to fix it up by producing the words e.g asking for the right utensils to eat (spoons), asking for the right pair of socks, etc.
8. Give Confidence
Your child would be different from normal child, but you have to try to minimize him feeling different so that he can be confidence of himself e.g tuck in his implant processor under his shirts, choose the correct colour for the coil to match his hair colour, etc. It is also important to share your view different people needs different things, some needs eyeglasses, some needs braces, and some needs cochlea implant/hearing aids. Let your child order Mc Donalds by themselves...
9. Put aside extra time to communicate
Sometimes with busy schedule either it's work, minding house chores, taking the other siblings to school, etc. you take communication for granted. You talk while you walk, you mumble a lot, that's not enough for your hearing impaired child, especially for the young ones. It is advisable that you set aside an extra time to communicate one on one with him/her. You can talk about your day at work, or ask about his day at nursery/school/home. Also you can talk to prepare him for somethings that new to him, e.g going to supermarket or going down to a friends house. Talk to him about what to expect and what people usually do in that kind of new situations. This way your hearing impaired child does not feel awkward with the new situation.
10. Support from the whole family
If you come from big family - as you would if you origins from Indonesia - spend some time with your big family of how they can support the hearing impaired child. Support can mean sticking to one language at home (to avoid confusion and quicker language imersion for the hearing impaired child), or actively play a role to support AVT therapy principles at home. If you are the only one that practising AVT at home while the other family member (grandpa/grandma, nanny, sibblings) do not even know what AVT is then it is something that you have to work on.
Making Meaningful Progress - 9 December 06
Today is a very special day for me and Fakhri. He has been working hard this past weeks learning to differentiate his early listening sounds. I am confident that he has understand a good deal of early listening sounds, but he has to prove it yet to his therapist !
I have proposed to his therapist San-San that I bring Fakhri toys from home for this session. I noticed that Fakhri is a bit reserved boy, he is holding himself to new people, new surrounding, and new toys ! I hope by using his toys in the therapy session he can gets comfortable and willing to open up himself just like at home with me.
San-san was very supportive and in fact she asked me to lead the session. So I starts by drawing Fakhri's attention to a box in my hand that contains 3 items - all animals. I make a sound... "Mooo", offer him the box and ask Fakhri to pick up the cow. Fakhri opens up the box and take out the cow! We tried several time again, each round with 3 animals, and then up to 4 animals, and Fakhri picked up the correct animals! We then moved to transportation toys such as airplane, train, bus, etc... and Fakhri do good as well. Following is 6 ling sounds - there was time where Fakhri has eyed the correct toys e.g Monkey for the "i...i..." sound I produce, but then his attention is drawn to a new toy in the box that he then choose that new toy... :)
After that, San San introduced her toys and match it up with Fakhri's toy. We hope next time Fakhri will like to play with this toys without hesitant.
We also sing "Topi saya bundar" and introduce "Wee..." by playing sliding toy with him. He looks very interested and at the end of the session he lean to San San ask her to hold him. Myself and San San put a mark on Fakhri receptive & expressive sounds. There are 19 receptive sounds (transportation, ling sounds, and transportation toy sounds) that Fakhri has understood including some of them are cat, cow, fish, horese, lam, monkey, pig, puppy, tiger, airplane, bus, car, train, cock, duck). Receptive sounds are still limited at this point he can produces "Aaaa" for airplane, "Brmmm" for car, "Mmmm" for foods.
It is 2 months post-implant, and Fakhri has seems to understand his name. He turn his head whenever he hears his name is called - and this is not coincidence, as he does not turn his head if we call him by another name. I thank God Allah SWT for all of this and pray that Fakhri will gets better and better in absorbing new lessons......
I have proposed to his therapist San-San that I bring Fakhri toys from home for this session. I noticed that Fakhri is a bit reserved boy, he is holding himself to new people, new surrounding, and new toys ! I hope by using his toys in the therapy session he can gets comfortable and willing to open up himself just like at home with me.
San-san was very supportive and in fact she asked me to lead the session. So I starts by drawing Fakhri's attention to a box in my hand that contains 3 items - all animals. I make a sound... "Mooo", offer him the box and ask Fakhri to pick up the cow. Fakhri opens up the box and take out the cow! We tried several time again, each round with 3 animals, and then up to 4 animals, and Fakhri picked up the correct animals! We then moved to transportation toys such as airplane, train, bus, etc... and Fakhri do good as well. Following is 6 ling sounds - there was time where Fakhri has eyed the correct toys e.g Monkey for the "i...i..." sound I produce, but then his attention is drawn to a new toy in the box that he then choose that new toy... :)
After that, San San introduced her toys and match it up with Fakhri's toy. We hope next time Fakhri will like to play with this toys without hesitant.
We also sing "Topi saya bundar" and introduce "Wee..." by playing sliding toy with him. He looks very interested and at the end of the session he lean to San San ask her to hold him. Myself and San San put a mark on Fakhri receptive & expressive sounds. There are 19 receptive sounds (transportation, ling sounds, and transportation toy sounds) that Fakhri has understood including some of them are cat, cow, fish, horese, lam, monkey, pig, puppy, tiger, airplane, bus, car, train, cock, duck). Receptive sounds are still limited at this point he can produces "Aaaa" for airplane, "Brmmm" for car, "Mmmm" for foods.
It is 2 months post-implant, and Fakhri has seems to understand his name. He turn his head whenever he hears his name is called - and this is not coincidence, as he does not turn his head if we call him by another name. I thank God Allah SWT for all of this and pray that Fakhri will gets better and better in absorbing new lessons......
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