The Hearing Support Team Spring newsletter with a focus on Early Years

By Kerry McKee.

The Hearing Support Team (HST) have been producing newsletters since 2015.  This is the first time we have shared it online, so we thought it was time for a refreshed and simplified look.  We hope you like it.  We thank our colleagues from the Physical Difficulties Service for their inspiration!

The Spring newsletter focuses on re-introducing the HST’s role, sharing links and resources that we feel are especially useful for deaf children, young people and their families, and a look at Early Years in particular. The HST works closely with deaf children and their families from when they are diagnosed, which can be from birth.

We share an article written by Sarah Thomson who is a Teaching Assistant working in a nursery, supporting a deaf child. Sarah, inspired by working with a Teacher of the Deaf from the HST, expanded her knowledge recently by attending a course run by the National Deaf Children’s Society. The next course is in August;

NDCS – Deaf Awareness for Early Years Practitioners – CPD accredited course.

The final page of the newsletter is a poster advertising ‘Communicate and Play’ – the Hearing Support Team’s brand new online playgroup for pre-school deaf children and their families. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, HST ran regular face-to-face playgroups in Castle Vale and Winson Green (which of course we hope to resume when safe to do so). ‘Communicate and Play’ evolved from the need to continue this work in an online capacity.

So we hope you enjoy the newsletter.

Watch this space for the summer edition!

Best wishes, the Hearing Support Team.