Defining Hearing Difficulties

There are an estimated 8.7 million deaf and hard of hearing people in the UK.

Deafness and Hearing impairment constitute a cluster of syndromes which include:

• A lack of acuity in hearing
• The inability to distinguish all frequencies
• Difficulty locating sources of sound, speech etc
• Where the deafness is congenital there may be secondary difficulties such as speech and literacy development.

Although they are present across the age ranges, deafness and hearing impairment are significant conditions of ageing and are therefore more prevalent in some educational settings than others.

Deafness does not mean people hear nothing at all. The sounds they hear (and don’t hear) are different for every individual.

Figure 1 - Image illustrating the types of noises (including consonants and dipththongs) a moderately  deaf person will be unable to hear.

In general the more severe the hearing impairment the lower the incidence.

Many factors need to be taken into account when working with a deaf learner. These include the learner’s degree of deafness, whether or not they use hearing aids, their preferred method of communication, their literacy level, and what input is available from support workers and communicators.

Further reference:

• Becta ‘See and Hear - Using ICT to support the inclusion of deaf pupils in mainstream schools.’ Becta 2005.
• Deaf students in Higher Education – How inclusive are you? Giving deaf and hard of hearing students a head start. RNID et al. Oct 2002.
• WatchWords – Sussex Downs College 2006

You may also find the following guidance sheets useful: