BUSINESS FEATURE All Ears! Listening and Language Center Panther Creek facility teaches hearing-impaired children to learn through listening and speaking W hen Lee Rech’s daughter, Anna, was diagnosed with profound deafness,
BY KYLEE HAUETER
The center’s preschool allows hearing-impaired children to learn alongside their hearing peers, which Rech said is important for learning. “The hearing children are really good speech role models for the hearing-impaired children. We know that with good audiology, what goes in comes out,” Rech said. “If a child is hearing good speech from a peer … or whatever that child’s speech is, that’s what they’re going to be able to reproduce. The idea of inclusion in mainstream is so important for that reason— they’re picking up those same dialects or same cues or same colloquialisms that a hearing child will be speaking.” Allison Haggerty,
Lee and her husband were told their only option was to teach her sign language. “They told us to go to the book- store and buy this book called ‘Choices in Deafness’ and to learn sign language. We did it in tears,” Rech said. “Every chapter was dedicated to a di erent option of communication. … At the very back of the book was a section called ‘Auditory Verbal Approach,’ which is now the listening and spoken language approach.” Listening and spoken language learning is the spe- cialty of All Ears! Listening and Language Center, Rech’s learning center for children “We just got such hope,” she said. “It was just a game changer for us, and we immediately said, ‘I don’t know how, I don’t know where, but we have to nd this.’” The Reches found a therapist who agreed to work with Anna, and they spent the next few years traveling back and forth from Houston and Denver for treatment. While travel- ing, they understood the need for better access to this kind of treat- ment, Rech said. “It’s so needed in this community. … This is the only place that these kids can learn what we’re teaching them,” Rech said. “We are the only center in the North Houston area where we’ve completely focused on the LSL approach.” who are deaf or hard of hearing. When the center opened in 2014, six students were enrolled in the preschool portion of the center. Now, Rech said 48 children are enrolled across the preschool, therapy and the soon-to-open audiology clinic All Ears o ers.
From left: Abbi Wright, speech language pathologist; Lee Rech, executive director; Allison Haggerty, director of speech and listening and spoken language intervention; and Tracy Piontek, accounting and nance projects manager, work at the clinic.
PHOTOS BY KYLEE HAUETER COMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
HEARING IMPAIRMENT DIAGNOSIS Parents with children diagnosed with hearing loss often have minimal prior knowledge of hearing impairment, a lack of awareness of their options and no easy access to treatment.
32% of parents of babies in Montgomery County who fail newborn screenings do not follow up with an audiologist to receive diagnosis. 62% of children in Montgomery County who are diagnosed with hearing loss do not receive treatment.
51% of parents of babies in Texas who fail newborn screenings do not follow up with an audiologist to receive diagnosis. 95% of U.S. children born with hearing loss have hearing parents.
“THIS IS THE ONLY PLACE THAT THESE KIDS CAN LEARN WHAT WE’RE TEACHING THEM.” LEE RECH, OWNER, ALL EARS! LISTENING AND LANGUAGE CENTER
the center’s direc- tor of speech and LSL intervention, said in Montgom- ery County, 62% of children do not receive appropriate intervention in a
60% of children in the All Ears program receive nancial assistance.
60% of All Ears’ revenue is donor based.
timely manner following their diag- nosis with hearing loss. Rech said this is due to a lack of access to services, a lack of awareness of the di erent options and long waitlists. “That’s the real crime of it all,” Rech said. “In today’s world, these babies, if they get detected and get ampli ed right away and get into a program, there’s just no reason why they won’t have lovely speech and get into mainstream education at the earliest possible time.” Rech said All Ears allows her to give back to the community. “Seeing the same hope and inspira- tion that our families get by working with these brilliant experts, … it’s so rewarding,” she said. “I know what the outcome looks like; I know how scary it was in the beginning. I know how confusing and how hopeless it can feel. We’ve seen the path; we’ve seen the journey, we’ve seen the model; we know it works. It’s just really a rming to be able to do it for these families.”
SOURCE: ALL EARS! LISTENING AND LANGUAGE CENTER COMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
An audiometric booth serves as an audiology testing room to test children for hearing impairment. The walls of the booth are built to suppress noise outside of the booth. The audiologist performs the audiology test in this booth.
All Ears now provides audiology clinic services and has an audiometric exam booth at its new clinical location in Panther Creek.
All Ears! Listening and Language Center 1 Preschool 4881 W. Panther Creek Drive, The Woodlands 2 Clinic 4840 W. Panther Creek Drive, Ste. 208, The Woodlands 936-251-3021
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INTERFAITH WAY
www.allearscenter.org Hours by appointment
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THE WOODLANDS EDITION • SEPTEMBER 2022
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