reception child, blending & hearing problem

[Liz79]

We mentioned to our dd's teacher that she is really struggling with blending her phonics into words and that her concentration is poor. Teacher has also noticed this & was going to mention it. She has suggested we get her hearing & ears checked out. Also thinks dd misses the 1st sound of some words. We have sorted out Dr to look at ears & spoken to pediatric audiology about organising a hearing test, it will be 3-4 weeks. Does anyone have any experience of this & any advice to offer? Wondering if she has glue ear & might need grommets but am second guessing after consulting Dr Google.

Hello - I have a DD age three on this path at the moment.

first off, don't panic, even if there is a hearing difficulty it is unlikely to be severe and will be fixable.
second well done geting a pead audiology chech for under four weeks time, we waited three months for ours.
if its like the one we had it will not take too long, and has two elements, a small machine to each ear taking around five seconds that gives a printout reading to tell if each eardrum is vibrating, if it is then no current glue ear, if one or other are blocked they can tell you by how much and to what extent hearing is currently impaired. second test, done at same appointment is to see what sounds she can hear, earphones popped on child and child to react when she hears a sound, for us they are asked to react by putting a wooden toy into a boat.
the two tests, in conjunction with your concerns will be her starting point for diagnosis and treatment, most likley they will have a watch and wait for 12 weeks approach, then re test, this is because in half the cases of glue ear it completely clears itself.
good luck and please don't worry, take a little treat along for your child for doing well.

As someone who struggle due to a hearing problem who then went on and had DD with a hearing problem. You can help in the mean time.
Make sure your DD looks at you when you see so that she can read your lips (comes very quickly) and that you enuciate clearly to help her hear the sounds.
It sounds like the teacher is on the ball and probably already has your DD where she can see the teacher's lips when she is talking.
My DD has permanent hearing losing due to a very rare complication of glue ear, however this year she has visited several classes in her school to demonstrate her lip reading skills - she is word perfect as the school has been increasing awareness of ensuring a deaf person can always see your lips.
Interestingly all her paedatric hearing tests have been different to the ones RosemaryandThyme describes when she was a pre-schooler the sounds came from loud speakers in the room and if she look towards the sound a toy lit up and clapped it's hand. Since she has been in reception it has been the old fashioned headphones and say yes when you hear a sound. Current hearing test takes about 10 minutes preschooler ones used to be half an hour.

Thanks, since she came home I've been thinking there isn't much wrong with her hearing, she just doesn't concentrate! She's quite airy fairy & excitable & is easily distracted. I wonder if she just doesn't "get" the blending business. Her speech is good & teacher said she is articulate.