I went to the first part of a 3-day workshop today and discovered that my instructor was deaf. I didn’t actually realize it until she started signing while she spoke. Huh? She’s speaking perfectly with just a bit of a Virginian accent. (I only knew it was Virginian because she told us.) It just sounded a little Canadian to me. (Pronounces “mouth” more like “mooth”). Anyway, it was amazing. I guess she was born hearing (which she loved), then became hard-of-hearing (which she hated), and then completely deaf (which she’s fine with). I suppose it’s better to be one or the other. She also had an interpreter seated in the audience to act as her ears whenever we asked questions. It seemed so natural. She was an effective speaker, an entertaining teacher, and as we saw in the video clips she presented, a great therapist.

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On a side note…much of today’s lecture was going over normal development of an infant from birth to 18 months. She had an awesome handout that laid out gross motor, fine motor, oral motor, language, and cognitive development for each age group (clusters of three months). It was a very good review and now I have something to easily refer to when I have my own rugrat. I can just imagine having a crumpled version of the handout tucked in my back pocket to constantly keep track. Oh…I’m sure the therapist in me will be feeding my baby and saying, “Tongue lateralization? Check. No rotary chew yet?! Oh no! You’re behind!” How annoying is that?!