Mini Blog Series – 2. Forever a student
I have always loved learning but following Sudden Sensorineural Hearing Loss (SSHL) I gave up the idea of face-to-face courses and resigned myself to studying alone at home for some years.
A lipreading class proved to be the turning point in my trajectory to a new way of dealing with my hearing loss. Being part of a group facing similar issues boosted my confidence and restored my determination not to forgo the fulfilment that doing courses provided.
I enrolled on a one-year RHS Horticulture Course, the tutor wore my roger pen and I was overjoyed to participate once more in a class in the hearing world.
Although gardening is one of my passions, language learning is the one I love the most. I gave up teaching French after SSHL and missed it enormously. I simply could not conceive of a means of communicating with my degree of hearing loss. That was until my frustration that hearing friends were doing online language courses, prompted me to research possibilities.
Discovering online learning
I discovered that I could access online language classes and engage captions in whatever language I wanted. It was a complete revelation. Words cannot express the wonderful feeling of being able to converse again in a foreign language and read what the other students were saying.
It didn’t stop there, as I now enrol for other recreational courses in the knowledge that I can allow zoom captions without any of the other participants knowing that I have hearing loss, if I choose to do so.
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Don’t feel isolated
It is truly liberating and I would wholeheartedly encourage anyone reading this, to embrace learning opportunities using technology and support for deaf students. It ticks all the boxes in terms of improving confidence and wellbeing and avoids isolation, which as we know is detrimental to our mental health. Make Deaf Awareness Week the one to make a difference to your hearing loss journey.
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