Flor O’Mahony visited the school for a workshop on hearing and sign language. We learned about how we hear by playing a game. We role-played the different parts of the ear. Some children were the hairs in our ears which catch the sounds, another pupil was the cochlea and finally a pupil pretended to be the brain! The hairs caught the sound, who then passed it to the cochlea and then sent it to the brain. We used a ball to represent the sounds. Sometimes the hairs didn’t catch the sound!
Next we learned about deafness and how people can use sign-language to communicate. Flor taught us all the letters of the alphabet in sign language and then we signed our own names.
We also learned that sometimes a sign is for a whole word. We got really handy pocket size cards with all the sign language signs so we can continue practicing.
Flor also used an app on the ipad to test the sound levels in the classroom and what range sound levels are safe for our ears. So we’ve discovered that it might be better to turn down the sound levels on our i-pods etc. to be kind to our hearing in future. Flor showed us a video called 4 schools 1 language which was amazing. There are two boys at the front of the group who are completely deaf and watch the rhythm they have and they way they can dance. The two boys are currently sitting their leaving cert exams.
Thank you Flor for a great workshop. Take a look at photos from our hearing & sign language workshop.
