One of my students with special needs has moderate to severe hearing loss. Even though his primary eligibility for special education programming is DHH (Deaf or Hard of Hearing), his parents do not believe that he has any hearing deficits and consequently have not followed through over the last several years in pursuing free hearing aids from the state. This denial is fueled by multiple factors, including low-quality special education services at the student's previous school and the fact that the students' primary doctor has given a passing score on a hearing test in the past. As a result, this student's SLD (Specific Learning Disability) is further exacerbated by the fact that he cannot hear critical sounds such as /th/ and /s/ and is missing out on key information during instruction. During a recent IEP meeting, the audiologist stated that this was becoming an issue of child neglect, and was grounds for reporting. When the father was informed of this, he became very defensive. Safety had clearly been breached. Regardless, I felt an urgent responsibility to persuade his parents of the need for hearing aids, and therefore initiated a crucial conversation after about a few weeks of building trust (and safety) by tutoring the student each day after school.
The father came into my office to pick up his son from tutoring, and he provided me with an updated hearing test from the student's primary doctor. Using S.T.A.T.E., I began by stating the facts. I held the doctor and audiologist's reports side by side and explained that both experts had come to the same conclusion, which was a "fail" in both ears beyond a certain benchmark. Immediately, I sensed defensiveness from the father, so I stepped out the conversation and used a contrasting strategy to clarify that I was not suggesting that his son could not hear anything, but that his hearing was at a level where he was missing a host of critical sounds. I then provided an example from a recent math lesson about decimal place value, where the student could not hear the /th/ sound in tenths, hundredth, etc. and consequently missed the primary objective of the lesson. This led to some traction by the father, but I still sensed that he was not fully onboard, so I grounded us in our mutual purpose. I reminded him how much that we both care for the well-being of his son. At this point, he relaxed and I offered my story, which included a recommendation that we fit his son with temporary hearing aids for at school use only. In order to keep it the conversation tentative and test the story, I encouraged the father to seek a third opinion in the meantime. To my delight, the father agreed. We fitted his son with hearing aids today, and if I could only describe in words the look on the student's face when the audiologist first turned them on. While I recognize that there is much more to do before fully convincing the parents of the need for permanent hearing aids, this small victory along the way is making the long journey well worth it!
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Having evidence to back up your statements definitely helped with convincing the father to invest in the conversation. Often times, when it comes to recommending anything to a child's parents outside of your designated professional expertise can be difficult. Ironically, in this case you had to make this difficult conversation regarding medical concerns in order to maximize your student's learning benefits. Seeking a third opinion was helpful but initiating this conversation was the best first step.
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