"Hogar Feliz" - Happy Home: Strengthening and Giving Hope to Families with Deaf Children and Teenagers
The Filadelfia School for the Deaf is a bilingual Colombian Sign Language / written Spanish school. Most deaf children at the school come from hearing families and it is often difficult for them to communicate effectively with their parents and siblings at home. This can lead to frustration, misunderstandings and, sometimes, behavioural issues.
The Happy Home Project aims to support families of deaf children at the Filadelfia School to improve communication at home. Project staff will work with parents and carers in order to provide them with useful tools and knowledge to increase family communication. The project aims to foster a positive environment in which deaf children and young deaf people can realise their potential and grow up to be succesful and self-confident adults.
- Recipient:
- Filadelfia School for Deaf Children
- Country:
- Colombia
- Implementing partner:
- Sense International (Latin America)
- Project contact:
-
Patti Jones (Filadelfia School for Deaf Children)
- Start date:
- 15 February 2007
- End date:
- 15 February 2008
- Total budget:
- 44,807.20 COP (�10,001.61)
- Beneficiary type:
- Parents, Young deaf people, School aged children, Pre-school aged children
- Project type:
- Parents' group, Sign language, Deaf awareness, Information materials
Summary:
This project was created in response to the realisation that many of the difficulties faced by deaf children and young deaf people are related to their home and family environments.
Colombian law places the responsibility for the care of children with disabilities with their parents. Yet there are no existing services targeting the psychological needs of deaf children or programmes seeking to improve family communication.
After consulting with parents and carrying out research, the Filadelfia School aims to support the families of its students by offering them sign language classes, providing them with information on the social, cultural and psychological aspects of deafness, allowing parents to meet each other. Project staff willalso carry out home visits to offer one-to-one support to families. A group of parents will receive extra training in councelling to support other parents once the project is finished.
Aim:
This project aims to
- improve family communcation and provide deaf children with a positive home environment in which they are participating members of family life
- increase parents, carers and professionals knowledge of issues relating to deafness
- train a group of parents to share this knowledge with and support other parents of deaf chidlren
- train parents and young deaf people in leadership and management skills to encourage them to advocate for deaf children's rights.
Beneficiaries:
- 33 deaf children from 4 to 14 years old and 66 members of their families
- 89 deaf students from 13 to 25 years old and 178 members of their families of deaf children
- 20 parents of deaf blind children.
Activities:
- Four-hour peer counselling training sessions for 20 parents every Saturday morning over a one-month period followed by regular consolidation sessions during the school year. These sessions will be carried out in spoken Spanish with the support of an SL interpreter. They aim to train a group of parents to provide information on deafness as well as basic counselling to other parents during the project and to carry these on after the end of this project.
- 40 workshops for 150 parents on Saturday mornings over an eight-month period. These workshops will be carried out in spoken Spanish with the support of an SL interpreter. They will tackle topics such as deaf culture, bilingual/bicultural education, relationships between parents and children, financial and budgeting issues, sex issues, prevention of substance abuse, etc. After these classes, parents will have the opportunity to socialise and share their experiences and ideas.
- Colombian SL classes for parents developed and led by a deaf adult.
- 75 home visits. These home visits aim to provide support to individual families as well as an opportunity for project staff to assess progress in family communication and provide feedback.
- 75 outside consultations with professionals based on needs identified by families in cooperation with teachers and school staff. These consultations aim to sensitise professionals to the needs of deaf children and their famileis as well as provide them with practical tips.
- Family integration day to assess the overall impact of the course and act as a "closing ceremony" for the project.
- 20 in depth reports on selected families focusing on family relationships and communication. These will be integrated to the project's final report as well as inform future family communication programmes.
- Production of a manual documenting the lessons learnt during the project and to share these with other interested parties.
- A video documenting each workshop on a weekly basis will allow parents who have not attended to "catch up"
Achievements:
This project is now completed.
The summary of project impact.
The project was created to improve communication between deaf children and their families with the wider aim of the deaf children realising their potential and growing up as successful, independent and self confident adults.
The impact has been on several levels:
- The marked improvement in communication between the deaf children and their families has meant that the situation in the families has improved
- As a result of improved communication, the parents have been able to teach their child many things, including life skills
- Parents have become more involved in their child's academic work and are supporting them with their homework, leading to increased achievement and positive attitude of the children at school
- Although it is early to assess the impact on the children's development, the children have a better chance of growing into confident adults who are socially and financially independent because of their improved communication and social skills as a result of the project.
The project has highlighted the urgent need for early identification of deafness in Colombia. It is also evidence of the success of parent support networks.
A survey was carried out with all participating parents to find out about their involvement in the project, areas of interests and perceptions of deafness. This was carried out through conversations with parents. Project staff found that it would also have been useful to document this and provide parents with a written survey in order to have more information for evaluation purposes.
Peer counselling training sessions
Four-hour peer counselling training sessions were carried out over one month for 20 people every Saturday morning. Participants represent a sample of deaf children's carers; men and women in a variety of marital and professional situations. They received intensive Colombian Sign Language (CSL) courses as well as leadership training delivered by the School's community living officer in spoken Spanish with the support of an SL interpreter.
These activities allowed participants to get to know each other and to build their self-esteem. Project staff feel that in the future and if project activities were to be replicated this activity would benefit from being longer.
Participants expressed what they felt and had experienced as parents of deaf children; powerless, pain, guilt and anxiety for the future of their child. They also discussed the importance of having someone to discuss these feelings with and meeting other parents in similar situations. They underlined the acute lack of available information and training available.
Parents feel supported in bringing up a deaf child through meeting other parents (peer support) and support from the school.
Workshops and parent interaction time
Workshops on leadership skills have been carried out. After workshops parents are able to have refreshments together. This allows parents to discuss lessons learnt as well as to exchange personal experiences.
Project staff suggested that this time for interaction should be integrated into workshops and that parents should benefit from more time to exchange personal experiences. Some topics have raised more interest than others and eaten into the time for parent interaction. Project staff are paying more attention to time keeping.
Some of the topics discussed during workshops were Deaf culture, bilingual and bicultural education, technology available to deaf children, managing family finances, relations between hearing children and deaf parents, family communication, authority and discipline, etc.
"The workshops have allowed parents to ask questions, share the challenges they faced, support one another and discuss ways in which to improve family life" Cristina, project manager
Through informal discussion following workshops, parents have become friends and are now able to support one another outside of the project framework.
"As from the moment the happy home project started, parents have benefited from a space to meet, get to know one another and most importantly, become friends. In the 30 minutes [informal discussions] parents have a chat about the workshop topic, have a laugh, share problems and solutions which cropped up during the week and help one another. The most important thing is for parents to have someone who they can identify with understand and listen to the challenges they face" Cristina, project manager
Colombian SL classes
CSL classes have been divided into three levels (70 participants in basic, 30 in intermediate and ten in advanced) and take place twice a week over a two-hour period. Participants were initially assessed through informal activities such as games and role play. They were then placed in the relevant class.
During classes with parents and carers, siblings have also been receiving CSL classes in an informal setting through games. Their progress has been very rapid. This was not foreseen in the original project but the school has been able to use students carrying out their social service.
For the Colombian National Day, children at the school signed the national anthem and the song for Bogota in CSL to parents. This had a huge impact on parents and encouraged them further in their efforts to learn CSL.
Parents have learnt sign language and are able to communicate with their children.
There is less conflict in the families due to improved communication. Support from professionals was only taken up by some parents; their family relationship improved as a result.
The deaf children have got to know their parents and siblings better and are spending more time with them.
Home visits and case studies
After a needs assessment carried out between project staff and families, 75 families have been selected for home visits. 20 of these families will be selected to carry out an in depth case study of their experience of the project as well as the needs of their deaf child.
Home visits are an opportunity to gather the whole family to discuss issues affecting the deaf child as well as family relationships.
"Whenever we visit a family, we are always very well received. Parents and children open us the door to their house and their heart. They are more often than not the ones starting the conversations and openly discussing family events and challenges they face with their deaf child. Sometimes it's very funny and other times it's very sad. For example, the illness and consequent passing of one of the participating mums was quite traumatic. It was good though that we were there to accompany the family in their pain and offer practical advise". Project worker.
Family visits have provided more individualised support to parents.
Outside consultation with professionals
Depending on the need of families, the Filadelfia school has organised sessions with relevant professionals. All members of the family participate and interpreters are provided to ensure that deaf children are benefiting from the discussions. Each member of the family has the opportunity to present their point of view.
Each family member is given a series of tasks and exercises which allows them to tackle the challenges they face and come up with common solutions. All this is fed back during follow-up meeting which allow participating professionals to assess progress.
Production of video and manual
Parents and project staff have come up with a list of themes to include in the manual. Themes include, what is deafness, causes and consequences; how to read an audiology test; bilingualism and biculturalism; useful contacts; summaries of workshops; technology; why learn Colombian Sign Language; your child's future; family communication, sports activities; frequently asked questions.
