Information for Parents

Introduction

There is a BSL version of this available.

This is an exciting time for deaf children, their families and other people who work with them. Because of the Newborn Hearing Screening Programme (NHSP), deaf babies are now being identified at around 8 weeks of age rather than at an average of 22 months before the screening was started.

Other changes have happened recently such as:

• the Modernising Children’s Hearing Aid Services programme and the introduction of digital hearing aids
• the Early Support programme
• official recognition of British Sign Language (BSL)

All this makes it an ideal time to try and find out what is best to help individual deaf children to develop.

Permanent deafness from birth can cause problems with language, communication and literacy. These can affect a child’s behaviour, quality of life and achievement at school. There can also be effects on the life of the whole family. A new project was begun almost three years ago to help us to have a better understanding of what kind of early support enables deaf children to do well.

The Big Lottery Fund Grant

The Big Lottery Fund awarded a grant to a group of organisations to look at what can lead to a better quality of life for individual deaf children and their families. The organisations working on it are Deafness Research UK (the Hearing Research Trust) with the University of Manchester , University College London (UCL) and the National Deaf Children's Society (NDCS).

There is a BSL version of this available.