Aural Rehabilitation/Lip Reading/Speech Reading
Hearing loss can reduce your capacity to enjoy yourself in social settings and impair your ability to function successfully at work. Many individuals, especially those with newly identified hearing loss, may struggle to maintain the listening and communication skills that they have enjoyed for years. If you have just received hearing aids, Speech Reading training may facilitate adjustment to hearing aids as well as enhance your communication skills with family and friends.
At HASA, we are pleased to offer individual and small-group instruction for persons with hearing loss who wish to improve the quality of their communication skills. Our emphasis is on the development of Speech Reading skills which include lip reading. While lip reading is the ability to recognize different speech sounds by observing the movements of the speaker’s tongue, lips and jaw, Speech Reading is more comprehensive. It is defined as the ability to understand a speaker’s thoughts by watching the movements of the face and body and learning to use that information to interpret the speaker’s message in specific settings such as restaurants, physician’s offices or shopping malls.
Individual instruction and small classes provide you with opportunities to learn how to use your hearing aid and other amplification technology in various settings. Individual instruction is ongoing and can begin at any time. Small classes typically meet for six sessions and are offered at various times throughout the year. HASA offers beginning and intermediate Speech Reading instruction. Classes may be arranged at off-site locations if requested.