"i hear that!"

m has been going to her school, jean weingarten peninsula oral school for the deaf, since she was 7 months old! at first she went to one on one speech therapy for an hour a week. last school year she increased to two days of class a week and 2 hours of speech therapy. this year she goes three days a week to class and 3 hours of therapy! every day starts with the whole school and staff at morning music. one of the things that i really like about jwposd is that they see parents as the ones who are teachers 24 hours a day. our time there is not just for little m, but it is also to teach us as parents how to foster speech and language at home and in the future.

(i promise not to keep posting lots of videos, but thought these would be relevant to this post, especially in tandem with m's speech sample video that i posted last week.)

here is a snippet from morning music a couple of weeks ago:




thanks to her hard work, to the guidance of her teachers and speech therapist, and to our own work at home, monrovia is thriving. she is learning to think through situations, listen and speak. her school consists of typical hearing kids, kids with a range of hearing loss, and profoundly deaf kids. it has been a commitment to drive an hour each way to school, but the sacrifice has resulted in great gifts for our daughter and for us. she is surrounded by immensely talented professionals who tailor their interactions with her to her individualized needs and level.

here is a bit of morning music from last november. you can see here how much little m's langauge has skyrocketed since a year ago:


here is a minute from little m's class during play/exploratory time last november.

next month is jwposd's annual benefit to raise money for the school. as you can imagine, her school is in a hard financial place right now- as most organizations are. i would love for this school to continue and thrive long after we leave, as it has transformed our daughter into a speaking, listening deaf child. donations to the benefit are being matched, so this is a great way to help her school out with funds. if you are in any way inclined, you can donate cash in any amount-even a few dollars, donate an item to the auction (anything! even something small can be grouped together with other items. you can donate services or goods!), or even sponsor a table-top. for more information on anything related to donating to or attending the benefit, go here.

i am so grateful to the work of this school, and i see it as such an amazing cause, so wanted to give anyone who has followed our daughter's story the opportunity to be a part of enabling it to help other kids who have hearing loss.