An Article: "A Healthier Lifestyle Promotes Better Hearing"

Someone contacted me and wanted me to post this article. Took me a while (sorry! School and such!) but here it is! By John O'Connor:


A Healthier Lifestyle Promotes Better Hearing

Eating a well-balanced nutritional diet can help provide a better quality of
life. Adopting a healthier lifestyle promotes better hearing as well. When reducing
an individual's high-calorie consumption, inner ear protection and hearing health is
greatly affected.

The medical community has been repeating the term "free radicals" for some
time. This is due to the discovery of harmful effects these radicals may
produce. The creation of free radicals occurs from an unhealthy caloric
intake. Consuming high quantities of high calorie foods produces high levels of
these radicals. We all carry free radicals in our bodies, and a normal level is
expected. Free radicals become dangerous as higher levels build up in the bodies
system. Once the radicals reach dangerous levels, they wreak havoc on our
system. High levels have the proven ability to damage cells. Once a cell is
damaged the percentage of cancer to the abnormal cell increases significantly. Also
linked to high free radicals levels are a faster aging process, cardiovascular disease,
Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and diabetes.

The scientific body at the University of Wisconsin released a study showing a link
between a newly discovered enzyme and high free radicals. This enzyme drastically
reduces the levels in our system. The correlation between this discovery and
hearing loss is the link to poor eating habits. The smallest organs and bones in our
body also hold the smallest defense against free radicals. The inner ear houses the
location of three very important bones. Their job is to send a message telling the
brain to determine or interpret the difference between various sounds. Permanent
hearing loss occurs once these delicate bones suffer damage created by free
radicals.

The hearing aid industry has a variety of systems to meet individual's particular
hearing and cosmetic requirements. The latest technologically advanced system is
the digital hearing aid. These invisible systems are available in many styles and
colors. This digital style is extremely small and fits inside the ear canal.

The CIC (completely in canal), BTE (behind the ear), and RIC (receiver in ear)
hearing aids are custom-made and available in many sizes. The CIC version
includes a full-scale ear clasp design, which is the largest of the styles. The
traditional BTE are for those individuals who prefer to continue with the standard
system.

Currently there is no available evidence that damage to the inner ear is reversible
which makes prevention extremely important. Taking the necessary steps for proper
ear care and protection will sufficiently benefit your hearing. Always wear effective
protection such as earplugs and earmuffs when subjected to loud noises. Work
place machinery, loud music and home power tools and mowers all have the
capability of causing significant permanent hearing damage. Never poke anything
into the ear canal as damage to the eardrum can occur as well.

Home Visit on April 13th, 2012

My mentor, Debbie, and I talked a lot about going on a home visit and I was able to go on one on Friday. I even ate my lunch in the car to go, haha. Anyways, I wasn't really expecting for anything crazy or over the top awesome home visit, because I have never been to one, but it was nice.

When we got there, they were really nice. The daughter, who had cochlear implants, was super sweet. Debbie told me their story in the car on the drive there and back, too. She said Diana, the 2 & a half year old girl, went into surgery when she was around 6 months old. Cochlear ear implants are basically extremely powerful hearing aids that destroys whatever is left of the person's hearing. It then uses a computerized device that sits on the outside of the person's ears with magnetic things that are placed onto the hard part that is about an inch or two behind the person's ear.

I learned from watching Switched at Birth that although these are ideal and usually work extremely well, there are extreme risks and emotional things to go through. Daphne, the girl who is deaf on Switched at Birth, decided to not get cochlear implants. The reasoning behind this is because it would place her out of the deaf community and into the hearing world. Yes, although this would make her life easier, it would definitely be different.

Anyways, back to the home visit. I really enjoyed it. It gave me a perspective on a potential career in helping the deaf. Debbie was continuing this profiling on which they keep track of Diana's progression in different caterogies such as being able to talk, comparing things, signing and/or talking, drawing, motor skills, etc. I think it is important to do this things because for a deaf child, it is different than raising one of hearing. In comparison to my little sister who is just 2 months older than Diana, she does a lot more. That's because with hearing, the child takes in whatever the people around them are saying or what they hear on tv, much more than a deaf child does.

Which brings me back to those lectures that my S.E.E. signing teacher gave about the hardships of being a deaf child or a deaf child's parent with or without previous knowledge of the deaf culture.

During the home visit, at first Debbie would play with Diana and show signs of animals. She was trying to see if Diana would remember which animal she hid or took away from the board, but Diana usually never guessed. It was so cute though because when it came to her own playtime, she made the animal noises of the animals she was matching with the pictures.

I hope to go more frequent or work with some kids or be able to sign with a deaf child fully or completely because I think that would make my project even more, I guess, seem worthwhile.

Another Mentor Update (Home Visit, Comments not working)

Great news!! My mentor emailed me this week and I get to go on a home visit with her this Friday, April 13th, 2012. We tried a couple times before (as in trying to have me go with her on a home visit so that I can meet a deaf child and see what she does), but it was a quick idea. The parent did not get back to my mentor on time, so I was unable to go with her.

What I hope to get out of the home visit (and hopefully more home visits in the future) is just seeing how it feels to talk to someone that can't talk or can't hear or just signs. I want the actual hands on with me there experience.

Also, my mentor emailed me and she told me she has been trying multiple times in commenting on this blog but she said that there was some error, so nothing was ever posted. I emailed her back and asked her if it was alright if I posted myself what she wanted to comment. I am still waiting for her response.

She also says she apologizes for not providing me with better mentoring.

Finger Spelling and Mentor Update

Hello!! Learning signing has still been tons of fun. Last class we practiced finger spelling. It means to finger spell a word. It may sound easy, but even after memorizing the signs for each letter, it is extremely difficult to just finger spell out of nowhere. It is not a one person job either. When having a conversation with someone and you may not know a sign, it is much easier just to finger spell. Sounding out the letter instead of spelling the entire word in your head is a lot easier, too. Say the word "eat." When you see it on paper it's easy, but when reading it through finger spelling, although it is only a three letter word, one might read it as "ee-ayyy-t." I don't know about you, but "ee-ayytt" is not a word. Haha. Since we know English, it is easy to correct ourselves since it is a small word, but with younger kids who are deaf and can't hear themselves, it's difficult. A lot of words have different sounds than others. Some have silent "e"s that you can't tell someone just through finger spelling. So "ate" could be phonetically read as "aahh-t-eee" instead of "ate." Longer words....well that's a different story. With practice it is most definitely a lot easier for me to read, but before all the practice Lois (my teacher) gave us in class, it was SO hard.

Now about my mentor... I must admit, my Senior Project has been mainly taking the class, practicing in class, teaching a small amount of words to my friends and family, rarely signing with my sister, signing words to songs, etc etc. I haven't been working with my mentor to the full extent is mainly because I've got so much on my plate and so does she. I've got Chemistry two nights a week. My signing class in between the two nights of Chem (so Wednesday nights). I used to meet with my mentor, but especially this semester everything has been piling up in both of our lives. I promise to try harder and call her and talk to her about this. To be honest, life just catches up to us and it's not easy.

I have grown in this process though. Learning signing, the background of it all has been so much fun and I'm not even stopping at the end of Senior Project. This is something I want to pursue even in school or in my future career somehow. I hope to continue my studies in the deaf culture and learning signs and practicing them so that I don't forget. It is something in this world that not everyone knows about and maybe my small part in knowing about it may help.

Which reminds me, one day at Tech, one of my friends seemed to be interested in signing. I think I was signing at one point just for fun or someone asked me what the sign for a word was. James (the friend who asked) asked a lot of questions too. I was really happy to answer them. I remember explaining to him the differences between ASL and S.E.E. signing. I learned it all through the signing class I am currently taking. It's on its third class and boy, it easier, but with so many words, I don't remember them all. Anyway, back to James... It was a great conversation. I told him why ASL is merely conceptual whereas S.E.E. signing is the exact word. Some may say ASL is much better (for reasons I do not remember) when S.E.E. signing, I believe, helps children learn English. All those difficult words that may "sound" wrong when used in a sentence are not applicable to deaf children. They can't hear those words because of their deafness. Through S.E.E. signing, it is a tool that assists them in learning these things.

Teaching My Friends and Family Signs

Since learning S.E.E. signing isn't as much fun by myself as it is with others, I thought teaching my friends would be a good idea. Plus, when I told them that was my Senior Project, they asked what certain words were.

Some signs are quite inappropriate such as: horny (the "hunger" sign repeated), poop (one of my friends taught me that), and MANY others. One day, during S.E.E. signing class, we were learning the sign for "hunger." My classmates and I are such weirdos and ask countless questions. One student, I can't remember who because we learned that sign quite a while ago, asked something along the lines of "What happens if we want to say we're really hungry? Do we sign "hunger" more than once?" And Lois, my teacher, laughs because that means "horny."

Haha, and then another day at school, one of my friends taught me the sign for "poop." At first I was confused but then she fingered spelled the word and I understood. It was so great. The next time I had class, I told my classmates my friends taught me the sign for "poop." Then, I think I was looking at this concert hall and I said "whoa! It's huge!" My classmate thought I was talking about "poop" still. When my teacher came back to the classroom, I signed to her "huge poop" and she laughed. Signing is SO much fun!

I also have an almost 3 year old sister named Mia who I've taught a few signs. She remembers the sign for milk. If only I signed a bit more to her, I think she could pick up a lot more signs.

One of my friends at my high school is obsessed with buses. I taught her the sign "school bus."

During one class session, I have no idea why, but I taught the word "drug" to the people that were sitting at my table. I think it just popped in my head and I thought it would be interesting to teach another sign to some more people.

If only I could find someone who is close to me or lives close to me, or even just is easy to communicate with (online like Facebook, or through texting, or meeting in person), I think I could enhance my skills so much more with someone who knows and understand the language for me to practice with.

Pictures!

A couple weeks ago I took pictures of the class. (Of course I asked for permission!)

I just wanted to show the setting and different ways of how we learn signs.

Here are the pictures!

Lois stands @ the front of the class and shows us the signs as we also look at the signs in our  packets.

Lois is showing the class, I believe, the sign for grass!

She speaks to both sides of the room so that we can see the sign at different angles. She's great!

We're not a very HUGE class, but we're like a family :) The room is small too, haha.

Looks like Lois is signing the letter "G."

She may be thinking of what the sign may be like. Lois always gives us ways to remember the signs.
She is signing the letter "E."

Leanna (my sister) and her friend (Dexyra) both take the class with me.
They're both only 10! I think they're the youngest in the class.

I wanted to show different angles of the classroom.

Here's Chiquita and Nathan in a signing group.
Sometimes we go in the other room.
This time we were practicing finger spelling and rhyming.

Usually there's a group of four: two on one side and two on the other.

I hope that in the near future, I will either film myself signing or have some videos going of mini lessons in class.

So many signs!!

It's the second class of my Signing Exact English class and I feel like it went by so quickly.  At first it was so difficult to learn signs because I didn't know any. Now that I know many more signs and I know the head of the family groups, it is much easier to learn new signs. Head of the family group means the main sign (that it usually does not have a letter with it) that other signs related to its concept are derived from. For example, I believe the main sign for vehicle is car. Other vehicles like jeep, bus, taxi, truck, and some others are like a car, just the letters are changed to match the word of the sign.

Lately, I've been trying to come into contact with people who sign or are deaf. I think it'd be quite interesting to immerse myself into the deaf culture. Lois, my S.E.E signing teacher, just finished 3 lessons on deaf culture with the behind the scenes and what goes on from birth until later on. Some of the things she explained made me stare in wonder of how deaf kids go through life.

Since my last entry, the 2nd class started, but it's been a lot easier (as I typed about above). I've also been watching this drama show on ABCFamily entitled Switched at Birth. In a nutshell, two girls find out they were switched at birth. One family is a middle class Latino family who raised Daphne who is almost completely deaf. Now that I think about it, Regina (the mother) and Regina’s mother were one of the families that learned sign and tried to make Daphne’s life easier. The other family, the Kennishes, raised Bay, who looked nothing the rest of her relatives. They were of high class. The show has lots of signing, but they  mainly sign ASL. With the captions and the signs AND the mouthing of words it has been extremely easy to learn signs. Although, ASL is much more conceptual. S.E.E. signing doesn’t conform to the slang of English. For example “break” can be used in many different ways. There’s “break in,” “break out,” “break off” and much more. Going back to Lois’ mini lectures on deaf culture, it is so hard for a deaf child to learn words as a hearing child would because they don’t hear it or even see it.

I am so glad I am taking these classes and learning about a world I’ve never been a part of. I wish I knew someone who was deaf. I think now, I would appreciate them much more than I would have before this class. As far as signing goes, I think I’m one of the students that remember a lot of signs. I’ve kept all the paper on the signs we learned and which words they belong to. Sometimes I think of what signs belong to words that people say and sign it inside my head. I attempt signing to songs, but that’s impossible… It’s so fast and I haven’t signed enough just yet. Even though this project is for school, I think I’ll continue pursuing it and learn more and more as the years go by.

I do hope to meet with deaf people. The difficulties they have are unbelievable. To communicate with someone using only my hands, I think, will definitely be a challenge, but a GREAT way to practice. I hope to email my mentor and teacher to set up meetings with those hard-of-hearing people. I can’t wait.