r/auslan

My daughter was diagnosed with profound unilateral sensorineural hearing loss at birth. We’ve been attending monthly speech pathology since she was 4 months old and she’s had a hearing aid since she was 3 months. She currently has about 12 words but doesn’t seem to be picking up new words the way other babies from my mother’s group are. I’m not sure if this is typical and just a case of every baby learning things in their own time or if this is related to her hearing loss.

I introduced a few KWS last week and she’s picked a few up. Also, do we finger spell people’s names or is there a better way to refer to people that aren’t related to us? E.g., we sign “grandmother” for my Mum, but how do we sign our friends names?

Her speech pathologist doesn’t know any sign, so I’m hoping for resources/ recommendations/ tips/ other people’s experiences. Also, given her hearing loss, should we look into Auslan or are we better to keep it simple for now and just use KWS?

Thanks!

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Completed an introductory Auslan course this year (side note, best $250 I've spent in a while). I work as a firefighter (Duty Commander) so I am in charge of multiple stations and have an office where I keep office hours, occasionally deal with media and have authority to issue evacuation notices etc. Given most of my job is customer service, do you think there is sufficient connection to claim as work related self education for tax? General advice only.