Experiences of impact of hearing loss in reception age children?

[CryMeARiverSong]

I wonder if anyone else has experience of small children with mild/moderate hearing loss and how it has affected them at school?

DS has moderate hearing loss in one ear. No need to wear a hearing aid, and has regular hearing tests. Our school are aware and make sure to check he’s following, can see people’s faces, is sitting near the front etc. But this week they said he’s been really zoning out, he’s struggling to focus, he’s just been lying down a lot. They’ve pointed out it’s the end of term and he’s likely shattered - he’s in wrap after school each day as well - but I’m wondering if having to do additional processing for the hearing might be having an impact.

I would love any tips or to hear anyone else’s experiences; he’s normally such a bright, chatty little button and very sociable and engaged and I’m worried he’s already starting to say he doesn’t like school and that it might be because it’s overwhelming him.

I'm deaf and had a moderate loss in both ears in reception; I wore hearing aids then and still do decades later.

Yes, it is more tiring for me to process sound than it would be for a hearing person. I have to try really hard to hear and I have to look for clues and piece together what's going on because what I do hear is incomplete. As a child, I spent a lot of time feeling confused. I struggled to make friends.

It helps if things are routine and predictable. It helps to have down time, away from social situations, to rest and recover.

But not everyone is like me and it's impossible to know how my personality influences how I coped at school.

You're right to be mindful. Gently talk to him about it and let him know he's not letting you down if he struggles. And be careful of praising him for appearing to fit in with his peers because if he's masking, you're basically telling him that pretending is good which is stressful. I got praise from a wide range of adults (teachers, grandparents, aunt/uncle, doctors) for presenting a lot like a hearing person but I'm not hearing and never will be.

If it helps, I got good grades, a good job, a good life. I remain a bit isolated though.

I have severe hearing loss in one ear and not perfect in the other. I had hearing aids at around 3 and 4 but by 5 I had stopped using them (with the Doctors agreement) as back in the day they weren't as good as they are now and we're causing more problems than they were solving.

Anyway that meant in reception I therefore didn't have hearing aids and the additional concentration needed is very tiring. Make sure he is sat near the teacher and that all the adults know to face him whilst talking. The worst thing for me was the teacher turning towards the board etc whilst talking because then I had to try to make up the bits of speech I missed.

It will get easier as he learns coping mechanisms and I think learning to read is especially difficult as the "sounding out" of words can be tricky when you are struggling to hear the sounds.

Have you looked into hearing aids? They are a lot better these days than they used to be so he might get on ok with them.

I still can't cope too well in noisy environments and have the subtitles on the TV etc but I life a perfectly happy life and most people don't realise I am deaf until I tell them.

Thanks so much for sharing your experiences. It’s really helpful to know how tiring it could be for him. Such a good point on masking, @LovemyassistancedogI know a lot of it is likely normal end of term tiredness but I worry so much he’ll fall behind and not enjoy school.

I’d love to hear from anyone with a child currently at school in case there was something that really helped them? I don’t think he is need of hearing aids - he basically has very very bad glue ear as was born with a cleft palate - but he thankfully gets checked every few months so they can let us know if that changes. And school are very keen to support, thankfully.

My son had glue ear in reception and it did affect his acquisition of phonics sounds, I think. Particularly some of the digraphs and trigraphs they get in term 3 are quite hard to grasp and mentally map if your hearing is muffled. Glue ear is mostly cleared by grommets now, but we’re still dealing with the fallout a bit.

My son is 6 and has glue ear with moderate hearing loss in one ear and mild in the other. He's in Y1. It's been diagnosed for around 18m, so covers all of his school life so far, but I wouldn't be surprised if it started earlier than that. It's hard to tell how much impact it has, he is doing well with reading and phonics and generally seems to enjoy school. He does get very tired and perhaps some of this could be attributed to him having to work harder to know what is going on, but perhaps not! The teachers are aware, and he sits near the front. And it's a small school with split year groups so they often work in smaller groups which I think must help.

One downside of having to sit near the front is having to sit next to or close to the worst behaved children, as they are also at the front for behaviour related reasons! He will hopefully get hearing aids in the next few weeks.

The other thing he struggles with is loud noises, e.g. the lunch hall, when the classroom is noisier, clapping in assembly etc. apparently this is common with glue ear sufferers but I think this bothers him more than the hearing loss from what I can gather.

I cannot understand why you have been advised a moderate loss doesn’t need adressing with a hearing aid. I am deaf and have worked with deaf children and I would definitely get a second opinion soonest.

What is his birth month? Is he summer born? The longer day, with childcare as well as school may be more tiring for him with the additional challenge of his hearing loss. Also, have you had his eyesight checked?

I appreciate you may not be in a position to work part time.

I was your son 50 years ago! I instinctively learned to lip read without really telling anyone but it was exhausting. Think like knowing a little of a foreign language but trying to follow a whole conversation. At some points you just have to zone out to preserve your sanity. I imagine at the end of term this is absolutely how he is feeling.
Hated loud and noisy environments (still do).
It didn't really affect my schooling because I always sat near the front so I could lip read and hear as much as I could.
I grew out of the hearing problems about aged 9 (glue ear) and discovered music because I could finally hear pitch and tone which was glorious (and kept my secret lip reading skill to myself).
Wishing you and your son well.

My child had moderate hearing loss in both ears due to glue ear in Reception. It was devestating as she made zero progress (actually went backwards in some areas), they tried to drill her with phonics many times a day in a busy and noisy classroom. They wouldn’t take her somewhere quiet to do phonics and just thought that repeating phonemes she couldn’t hear repeatedly would help her. Instead it destroyed her confidence and love of books.

The issue is that young children brains are different from older brains. If we can’t hear something our brains automatically fill in the gap. With moderate hearing loss on young children they are missing 50% of the words in a sentence spoken at a normal volume. If you add in the background noise of a classroom my daughter was hearing less than 50% of what her teacher was saying.

I’m really surprised you’ve been advised not to do anything about it. I’d seek a second opinion or pay privately if you can. Not being able to hear can be exhausting. If he starts to fall behind he’ll have to work twice as hard to catch up. I know a young girl who struggled all through primary with her hearing she was always behind and despite extra support never managed to close the gap. Eventually that distance between her and her peers became so great she just completely disengaged by secondary school.

My son was diagnosed with glue ear in Reception and has what was initially mild to moderate, and is now mild, hearing loss in only one ear. The other ear is fine. He is also summer born. I don’t think it affected his reading - he learnt fine and was always in one of the higher reading groups. I think it helped that I practised with him at home where it was quieter and he could go over anything he had missed in the classroom (I knew the phonics scheme as I had to do home learning with my older child in Reception due to COVID so was in a good position to help him at home).

I think he found the classroom an easier environment in Y1 upwards because they move away from the free flow Reception layout so there is less background noise. He was supposed to sit at the front so he can hear the r
teacher but he doesn’t now and it doesn’t seem to impact. The doctors told me the good ear compensates for the bad one.

As others have said, the thing he finds hardest is loud noises like lots of clapping in assembly or cheering. He wears ear defenders to the fireworks, for example. This can be hard if they have won something in assembly (like a star award) as they are proud and want to go up but find the noise too much. It’s got easier as he has got older but I took him to football match recently and he found the cheers when a goal was scored too loud.

I would suggest working with your DS at home on reading (in the morning when he is not tired) to make sure he hasn’t missed anything and having a word with the school about any small adjustments they can put in place to help him.

It’s probably because the hearing loss is only in one ear. My DS has mild hearing loss in one ear only with the other working fine. We have regular tests and the consultant has said he doesn’t recommend hearing aids for a young child where one ear is working well.

I think school could be doing more. Does your LA have a sensory impairment team? If so school should be referring. They can assess and give school information on how they can support your child. Ours is excellent and part of the inclusion team. It may only be things like handouts in larger font, sitting at the front, rest breaks etc but I’d speak to you school senco and see what more they can do

Hi all - thanks for so many thoughts and comments, I really appreciate it. The school are great and the Teacher of the Deaf has been in and assessed the space for him, and it was the teachers that raised how tired he was right now and have moved him right to the front of the class. He did have ear defenders at one point for lunchtime when he started as he found the dinner hall noisy although our audiologist said they don’t actually recommend them. He stopped using them at his own request and hasn’t mentioned that being an issue anymore.

As @metellaestinatrio says he doesn’t need hearing aids because it’s only in one ear, but he has tests every 3-6 months so it’s always under review and that might change.

I think it’s less the hearing per se and more the tiredness I’m worried about for now. It is a long day and the concentrating he’s having to do is clearly exhausting him in a way it didn’t in nursery. I hope a few weeks off will help reset him a little and then we’ll talk to the school again about whether he’s looking like he’s coping more when the new term starts or whether we need new strategies. The class room is quite small so I can imagine it is noisy when they’re all in there and that is a lot for anyone.

Re the tiredness, can they build in rest breaks to his day when he is allowed to play somewhere other than the classroom? Then he could give his brain a break from processing the excessive noise in the classroom. It depends on the layout of the school, but it wouldn't necessarily need a member of staff to be with them. The school where I work has a shared area with 3 classrooms that open onto it as well as the staffroom, so there are always lots of adults walking around who keep an eye on the behaviour of any pupils using the space. Sometimes a Reception child is unable to play outside because of illness / injury so a lunchtime supervisor will lead them to the shared area, usually with a friend and leave them there with some Duplo etc from the classroom.

DD had the double whammy of hearing loss and being summer born in reception through to end of yr 2 (signed off by peads aged 8 as “no longer deaf, just ignoring me”!) and she was often very tired. Her yr1 teacher used to allow her to nap in the reading corner!
She’s now yr6 and the only hangover from it is that she has no concept of how to pitch the volume of her voice for the environment she’s in, she’ll bellow in your face during conversations but mutter quietly at the floor in a crowded room.
We did do quite a lot of building up her confidence so she felt able to speak up and ask if she hadn’t heard something, she did have a habit of nodding along but not really knowing what was going on. School were very good with supporting this too

Struggles with blending phonics. Has had moderate to mild hearing due to glue ear his whole life. Language delay.

DD is Deaf. School was completely exhausting for her. They can put in all possible adjustments but the reality is that struggling to hear, process information, deal with multiple sources of sound, navigate missing part of every conversation, cope with too loud or too quiet etc is a huge amount to manage, in addition to actually learning something. DD was always shattered by the end of term, but generally we needed early bedtime every night, lots of down time, very low key after school.
Re no HA for your son - I've got a child in my school at the moment with a mild conductive loss and he's wearing a hearing aid; it's been very helpful.

Building in breaks are definitely something I’d like to talk to them about. Thanks @PunkTiger

He had a speech and language assessment when he was 2 and is having the next one shortly - there were no concerns there and he generally seems to speak very clearly compared to other kids, which was super reassuring. He’s managing to blend sounds and he seems to be able to hear the individual sounds distinctly, but again, very glad they’ll be checking that regularly at the hearing assessments. I def want to make sure he isn’t nodding along and def can hear! He asks for the tv to be put up at times.

He’s had a few perforated eardrums already so we’re asking for an ENT referral to check if there’s any scar tissue.