Parents, teachers, and speech therapists may be a bit baffled by what is supposed to take place in language development after cochlear implant surgery. In the case of children with little or no language, it is important that all who can support the child be aware of how they can help. The child should be "bathed" in sound recognition and ultimately, language. In this book, you will find strategies for language and/or speech development to be used after a cochlear implant, going by order of the months following surgery; for example, what you might do a few months after surgery, 6 months after, 18 months after, etc. building on what is learned and adding new sounds to those that the brain has learned to interpret. There is an order: those sounds both heard and seen on the lips, followed by sounds that use that interpretation to understand the next sounds. While learning speech is important, understanding language as a means to convey thought and concepts is just as important. The child needs to associate speech with communication. This guide can be an invaluable source of help.

Author Biography

Elaine Ernst Schneider has written articles, curriculum lessons, stories, and books over a span of twenty years. Her published work includes assignment-specific articles in books and magazines such as Catholic Digest, FellowScript, Parenting Today's Teen, HomeLearning Canada, Back Home, and Family Living. Two children's books include "52 Children's Moments" published by SynergEbooks in eBook and hardcover format and "Taking Hearing Impairment to School," published and distributed by JayJo Books, a Guidance Channel company. Schneider drew sign illustrations for the "I Can Say That" book, winner of the Early Language Literacy Award, and creates American Sign Language paintings as EloiseArt. Schneider has written curriculum for The Princeton Review; SureScore; Shawk (for their client, Learning Resources); NETS (for their client, Scott Foresman); Victory Productions, and Pearson/Merrell-Prentice Hall. She was the sole author for the California PASS Program's high school course American Sign Language. Her dedication to children has been most apparent in her years of teaching deaf children, including those who have received cochlear implants. Schneider's experience includes working with doctors and therapists in creating learning plans for children after the cochlear implant. What she has gleaned from these experiences is encompassed in her latest book: After the Cochlear Implant, A Teacher and Parent Guide to Developing Speech and Language. The language is reader-friendly with suggestions and strategies parents, caregivers, teachers, and support personnel can follow and facilitate.