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The Family Young (1996) in a perceptive research analysis has indicated that families create their structures and beliefs before they have deaf children. The family often has hearing children before it has deaf children. The expectancies and skills of parenting are often already in place prior to the birth of the deaf child. This has important implications for the type of change that is requested by professionals and by deaf people. The birth of a deaf child is likely to create stress for the family but not necessarily the grief and sense of loss that is often attributed to it by hearing professionals. Parents seek information and re-assurance. This may lead them to medical models and medical intervention as well as towards denial of deafness. It may also lead them to deaf people and to the deaf community. In a family intervention programme (Deaf children at School, Sutherland and Kyle, 1993) deaf people visited the home in order to support the families. The response was wholly positive and provided a re-appraisal of the deaf child in a more positive light. Since the intervention began from the point of diagnosis, this was a major effect on the child's language growth. Sign language was used at home and the child was more likely to arrive at school with a functioning language. Families exist before, during and after bilingual schools. In fact the family is the true host of bilingualism. |
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