Closed petition Support deaf children by making a financial commitment to restoring Teacher of the Deaf numbers
Teachers of the Deaf play a vital role in supporting the language and communication development of deaf children. They provide advice to families of deaf children, visiting them at school or college – supporting their education and provide guidance to mainstream teachers on deaf awareness.
But Wales has lost one-in-five Teachers of the Deaf since 2011. There are around 2,300 deaf children in Wales.
I am mum to 5-year-old Lola, who is profoundly deaf and 2-year-old Rudi, who is severely deaf.
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Deaf children living in a hearing world need ongoing support. But Lola and Rudi currently receive just one hour of support a week from a Teacher of the Deaf. Calculated over a year, during school time, that’s 37 hours, which does not even equate to my working week. I believe all deaf children should see a Teacher of the Deaf at least once a week regardless of level of deafness.
Lola is in a mainstream primary school, which is right for her, but had she gone to a special provision, she would be seeing specialists and other deaf children every day. Her progress is aspirational but if the technology fails, we have very little to fall back on.
I believe there is also a vital need for more targeted support for the parents of deaf children. More than nine-in-ten deaf children are born to hearing parents, with no experience of deafness. When we discovered Lola was deaf, I was shellshocked. I was also oblivious to my complete lack of deaf knowledge.
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