A Conversation with Cheryl DeConde-Johnson: COVID Return to School with Hearing Challenges

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This week I am honored and excited to sit down with Dr. Cheryl Deconde-Johnson a pioneer and leader in the field of educational audiology and deaf education (and one of my greatest mentors and friends).  Join us  today for a conversation about the hot topic of returning to school during a pandemic.  We will explore lessons learned as a result of the shut down and how it impacted students with hearing challenges and how we can use these lessons in the upcoming year as we begin to reopen.  You can learn more about Cheryl and her work at www.adevantage.com.  

Other Resources Mentioned in this Podcast:

https://edaud.org/

https://www.handsandvoices.org/index.htm

For more information about Dr. Carrie Spangler- check out her LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/carrie-spangler/

For transcripts of this episode- visit the podcast website at: https://empowearaudiology.buzzsprout.com

Transcript

[00:00:00] Welcome to episode two of EmpowEAR Audiology with Dr. Carrie Spangler.
[00:00:16] Hi, welcome for the EmpowEAR Audiology podcast. My name is Dr. Carrie Spangler, and I am your host for this podcast. And today we have a guest on our podcast today, Dr. Cheryl DeConde Johnson, and I'm really excited to have her today as we are going to be talking a lot about the pandemic and educational audiology and how students with hearing challenges are going to be.
[00:00:43] Going back to school or learning remotely or learning from a hybrid approach. So there's a lot of different that are going to be coming forth this school year. So before we get started about talking about the unknown and uncharted territory, would you just take a second to introduce yourself and your background and 
[00:01:10] where you came from and how you are, and where you’re at today? Well, where I came from was Anchorage, Alaska. No, just kidding. That's where I was born and the air force base anyway. Um, yes, this is great to have a chance to chat about the coming. Um, I don't know what to say beyond chaos, but, um, just an unknown. But anyway, my background is varied and starting off as a parent and then in communication disorders, educational audiology, deaf education administration.
[00:01:48] And, so I sorta just view myself as an advocate and like Carrie and just very passionate about knowing we can do a better job and we just keep persisting. I used to call it when I worked in the schools, gentle harassment in that you just keep prodding the person, the, the issue, the school, the whatever in a nice way, but not.
[00:02:16] Not backing down because, um, you know, we have a role in advocacy and we want our kids to take that role on as they get older, really the younger, the better, but, um, there's just a lot of people that misunderstand and we still have a lot of work to, they do. And we all know that. Having rigid steering, hearing status.
[00:02:38] It's not the same as others. Shouldn't really packed what, what you're able to do when you grow up. So anyway, I have a grown daughter. Too. That's been kind of my, my impetus and continues to, um, guide and stimulate me with her own issues around access in, in employment. And certainly now under COVID that unique situations that arise with trying to make sure she has access to the students she works with in a, at a college.
[00:03:11] And can you tell me a little bit more about your role with hands and voices as well? You said, as you said, you're a parent and an advocate that way. And I think that's kind of how you got started with hands and voices. That's true. Um, probably back around 1990, um, when I was working at the Colorado department of education and with other parents, um, being a parent, I was always.
[00:03:39] Concerned and ensured that there were parents involved in whatever we were doing. And, um, you know, we've just got together a couple of parents and we're thinking, you know, we need to have more of an organized parent voice and started at that time was called the hearing impaired family support network in 1990.
[00:03:59] [00:04:00] And, um, it evolved, um, and we now have hands and voices in Colorado. Right? Take, we changed the name maybe around 1999. Yeah. I can't remember exactly when that happened and continued our work. Um, we were fortunate to get funding through the health department and the department of education. Both of whom believed a role of the parent was very important and did activities for parents and.
[00:04:27] Yeah, we just had great response all the way around. And eventually other States learned about the work and we started to grow and grow and grow and hands and voices is, um, a really strong voice for parents. And what it's intent is that has remained is two things. One it's. Primarily parents. So it's a parent driven organization and it's not about modality.
[00:04:55] It is about getting, let families think they, their children need to be successful. So when you take away the modality issue, parents are all on the same page. As they are as professionals, they all want the best for our kids, whatever path it takes to get them there. We want it, but the advocacy becomes a big part of it, but because we're still.
[00:05:19] Building awareness and making sure that that path is smooth enough for kids to be successful in and what a great organization for a time, like now when there's so much uncharted territory and. Hesitancy and in decisiveness about how we're going back and how do we support each other and learning from each other.
[00:05:42] And parents definitely need that kind of support right now, what to do and what ideas and creativity can we have in this moment. So. And I just wanted to take a second to just share a little bit about how I remember meeting you. And that was a long time ago, I think, at a Phonak brainstorming event when we were.
[00:06:11] Going to do the gap program guide to access planning. And we didn't have a name at that time, but they had brought some different people together. And I won't forget that. I remember knowing your name out there as like the. Person who was the educational audiologist. And I just aspired to be an educational audiologist like you and I, but your handbook at a conference when I was still a student, I'm glad to score and to, um, Be able to meet you.
[00:06:45] I was so excited and then it has been such a great relationship. And you have been an incredible mentor for me throughout. I think it's been almost 20 years. Oh my gosh. [00:07:00] Now that we've known each other and I know you have become my great roommate for conferences. So it's, um, I really appreciate our relationship, um, both personally and professionally.
[00:07:12] So we have a lot in common in different ways. That is very true. And I'm all I'm doing is getting you ready to take care of me in my old age. Wow. Kumbaya relationship. Oh, well I think. You know, the big topic, obviously from a national perspective is how was schools opening up? So there's so many decisions that have to be made by amended administrative perspective all the way down to.
[00:07:53] All all aspects of education and from health and safety to education and [00:08:00] accessibility. And I think that's where I really would like this conversation to go. The guy was, you know, what did we learn from. When we shut down and merge and how did we, you know, what kind of things really popped up because of the shutdown and students who are deaf and hard of hearing.
[00:08:20] And then maybe once we talk a little bit about that, we can talk about what are some challenges we might see opening schools back up again. So, do you have anything about what you learned when we shut down for remote learning and different things that really popped up? Um, actually I think there, we learned a lot, some of it even positive.
[00:08:44] I think the difficulty was how unprepared schools were to go to remote learning. Um, and I have taught at the graduate level remotely for 20 years. So I'm used to teaching online and I understand a lot of the nuances of teaching online, but when you're a classroom teacher and you're used to having in a classroom and suddenly you're thrust into an online situation, lessons are different.
[00:09:14] You're you have to be much more structured. Many teachers are able to what I say wing it. They don't have, you know, extensive lesson plans. Because they're just natural teachers, but when you change the environment, what used to come to you naturally now doesn't and you've got just in general students that have little support at home.
[00:09:38] You know, there's two sides of this. Really? The children need to be supported to be ready to learn in the home environment. Just like we get. In a classroom, you get your kids ready to learn. At the beginning of the day, who's going to do that at home. Sometimes there is somebody home. And actually when we first went to remote learning, many parents themselves were either working from home or where they worked was closed [00:10:00] down temporarily.
[00:10:00] So there were parents at home. Um, but then also the teachers had to get ready to, how do they. Um, structure lessons online. So yeah, I think there's huge variability in how it was conducted. I think teachers had little direction in what to do. Principals just said, figure something out and there's all, you know, there's some families that never connected to online learning in their schools and there's others who did, um, There were teachers who were contracted to school districts rather than being employees of school districts who couldn't get access to Google classroom or whatever format, because it all went through their district email.
[00:10:45] And I remember a teacher telling me the deaf ed teacher telling me the classroom teacher says, Oh, you just work on the IEP goals. They don't have anything to do with what we're teaching in class, which is 180 degrees from what our teachers [00:11:00] of the deaf know that what they're doing supports everyday learning, but they need to know how their instruction is going in the classroom to support that.
[00:11:09] So it, it showed the inequities. Are they inadequacies maybe if some of our communication and at the same time, um, maybe open some doors. I think parents came much more appreciative when I talked to early intervention providers, parents really had to do the intervention to now. So it wasn't the intervention coming from interventionists coming in the home and just modeling, which, you know, we typically would model and then have the parents.
[00:11:41] Do the same activities, but now the, there was not a lot of ways to model. So you had to really be able to instruct parents, coach them much more coaching. So that was, you know, some of the good things I was talking to the teacher of the deaf in a state who still has a self [00:12:00] contained classroom. And she said for the first time she felt like she had the time to have.
[00:12:07] The discussions that prep, the vocabulary, all of those things with her students, because she had the whole classroom without interruption. Whereas before, when she was teaching in the same classroom, kids were still coming in and out to go to various specials or whatever. She thought that the kids got….
[00:12:26] much more instruction because she had much more time to devote to a lesson, and still do individualization with her kids. So yeah, all kinds of things were learned and I'm hoping that when classes go back in the fall, teachers have had a lot, yeah. Have time to think about what worked and what didn't work and at school administrators to think about that so that, you know, we're past that sort of trial and errors stage and more into, okay, this is what worked, let's expand on that.
[00:12:56] And that the schools are putting more structure [00:13:00] into the online learning. Yeah. And I think when we shut down, we were kind of all thinking and two weeks or a month would open back up again and it would be back to normal. So that was, I think another, I guess, um, hurdle in all of this where teachers are like, well, I'm going to get through this little bit of online learning and then we'll be back in the classroom.
[00:13:26] And that. Didn't happen. And I don't know if that's going to happen in the fall as well. So, uh, with your, I guess, more national perspective and working with different States, what have you heard from different States about opening back up or their experiences with remote learning? Um, I think technology is, is definitely a huge challenge deciding which kids needed at [00:14:00] home, which kids wanted at home.
[00:14:02] Um, how do we. Demonstrate to parents that, um, demonstrate to parents that their, um, children may benefit and could even understand better, you know, getting into this hearing versus, um, audibility versus intelligibility. Um, sometimes I think kids themselves think, Oh, I'm doing good enough. Or parents feel like, you know, they're doing they're hearing well enough.
[00:14:28] Um, so. I don't know what's going to happen. I feel for teachers, um, I feel for all the parents who have to work and how their children are going to be supported to learn at home. Young children need structure, I believe. And they need the discussion that relates different concepts to everyday practice and to experience and how you take online learning and push, integrate experience with it so that it becomes more meaningful.
[00:15:03] Um, Teachers last spring who were managing their own children's online learning and teaching their students being on call almost 24 hours a day because suddenly they, their students could contact them. Um, it was totally different in it. I don't know what the fall is going to look like. They, you know, well, there's totally in the classroom, totally online, a hybrid.
[00:15:29] I think there's going to be a lot of hybrids because of physical distancing and the other things. Um, obviously the, the mask issue is a huge concern for accessibility for teachers and kids and how that's going to be dealt with. In the schools, you know, as we've taught shields seemed to be such a great solution, but yet there's reticence because of the fear that they're not going to be sufficient to, um, keep people safe from, from droplets.
[00:15:59] Um, [00:16:00] uh, here there's less emphasis on. Getting COVID from contact that yet, as I was saying in an earlier conversation, I had today with a very talking about classroom acoustics in a very bare classroom teacher commented below that's what costumes are going to look like when we go back in the fall, they're going to remove all the materials in the books and the things that made the classroom so alive.
[00:16:27] Aren't going to be there. So then you begin to wonder why kids are coming back. They're coming back to a shell of their education. Obviously they have peers and relationships, but I don't think we know that this is yet another stage in trying to bandaid in the spring, just to get something, going to support our children, to trying maybe some different things, but without.
[00:16:52] Sufficient direction. Um, I know there's teachers that are turning their basements into studios so that they can have a place that's quiet, that they can [00:17:00] teach and have all their materials and have a chalkboard or a Blackboard or something where they can illustrate and demonstrate. So I don't know. Yeah.
[00:17:09] I mean, teachers are amazing and the creativity and the way to. Fine solution because they do want what's best for the kids that they owed teaching. And that's why they got into teaching to begin with. Um, but I, I like to go back to some of these points that you brought up about the mask and the acoustics and physical distancing and listening to peers.
[00:17:34] And I know we have had some conversations and just a more personal level. And I've shared with you, just my own personal experiences of being out in the community and being cut off from communication. And I always viewed myself as someone that could overcome a lot of my human challenges with [00:18:00] my cochlear implant and hearing AIDS and getting closer to someone and watching you and, and using these different coping strategies and.
[00:18:10] And I think you have shared too, your daughter kind of has gone to some of the same similar experiences I have. All of a sudden we have mascot and the community, which we know is very important for everybody's health and safety and slowing the disease or coronavirus down, but it really presents with.
[00:18:33] For us, for those who are working with individuals who are deaf and hard of hearing with the balance between what is your right for communication with ADA and Ida and five Oh four and what we're dealing with with a pandemic that none of us have ever had to deal with before. So I guess that's. [00:19:00] Kind of where I wanted a conversation to go next with reopening of school, then knowing what the challenges will be for students with hearing loss, what are some things that maybe we can brainstorm that might be helpful in a trial and error way, knowing that what we know today might not be what we know tomorrow.
[00:19:23] Have you thought about that? Yes, but it's like, everything is complicated. We, I think people are learning how much visual access impacts communication. And it's not just kids who are deaf and hard of hearing kids with autism, with young kids, with other learning problems. They. Learn by the facial expression and the tone of the person speaking.
[00:19:53] They may not totally understand the words, but they get information from seeing the face. So it's not just   our deaf and hard of hearing children. It's a lot of young children and the dilemma is how to provide access. Within the constraints we have of the appropriate masking, shielding protection, whatever it's going to be and where it, like you said, where's the balance?
[00:20:21] What do we, what can we give up to find that balance? And I think we need to learn from the children themselves to some degree and. They, you know, have these conversations so that they really understand what COVID is, why we're doing this, what the risks are, um, how they learn and recognize that. Learning might be more challenging, but what, what could happen that would help if, if there's more pre-teaching, if there's a combination of online where you aren't close and you can, you know, like we are talking now, even in a school building, this could happen and then kids could come together.
[00:21:05] Um, so I think children might have some answers for us. That maybe we haven't considered, and they may have some ideas for us that we haven't thought about. And I think having them be part of the solution will help them understand just in life in general, it's a give and take. You don't always get your way.
[00:21:25] It's not always perfect, but in resiliency, you figure out a way. To work through that. And I think that could be an important lesson if it's handled right way that kids really have the opportunity need to discuss why this is why we're here, why we're doing this, what are the challenges? You know, I mentioned earlier, that'll Mo my mapping activity for some, some teens might be really fun and see what they come up with.
[00:21:54] Um, and maybe you can even do that kind of an activity online with a group of students. One of the. Challenges for our deaf and hard of hearing students is that online learning has been very isolating. And I think one of the other things to consider is how we can bring even in a school district. If kids are in different schools, is there a way we can bring them together on a regular basis so that they can have a cohort, a group of peers that they, um, have an activity that they do within can look forward to meeting maybe weekly.
[00:22:27] So maybe there's more. Um, need and opportunity online because we don't have to take you out of school. We don't have to drive them somewhere, but there is more opportunity to try and do more grouping of kids. Um, there's yeah. It's. It's hard. I think, um, we don't have a lot of answers and it's going to be still learning as you go.
[00:22:53] But I think there are some suggestions that, um, you know, we can talk about, um, [00:23:00] using, um, remote mic systems is absolutely critical if they're going to be in class and going to have a mask, we know that the masks muffled speech. If they have a mask, they really should have window masks of some kind so that they have some access to the face.
[00:23:16] Still believe shields is one way to go. Um, But at least by using remote mic, then the, and the thing that gets to the student. And especially when you talk about physical distancing, you know, I was talking to my daughter about how she was going to arrange some of her counseling at the college level, and she was going to do things outside so they could physically distance.
[00:23:39] Well, once you put somebody six feet away and they have a mask on, even if it's a clear mask, It's really hard to hear what they say. So you've just added now yet another variable by wanting to be outside. So it's really kind of really looking at the situation and we can look at this set framework under UDL universal design for learning, which looks at the student themselves and what they need, the environment that they're going to be in.
[00:24:09] The tasks that occur and then what tools are necessary in order to be accommodated in that situation. And maybe just a simple format like that with students to have involved them in this sort of analysis, and then help them come up with some solutions that might, um, might work for them. And if they don't work, they've tried it and they'll try something else.
[00:24:32] So that way it can be a really good learning experience. Yeah, no, I really like that. Process. And we always talk about wanting kids to be their best self advocates buckets. And I think this is an opportunity for us as educators is related service personnel who are working with deaf and hard of hearing to really.
[00:24:56] Focus in on the self advocacy skills, because with everything that's going on, I feel this population is early hit hard. Uh, and we don't really talk about that because we are, you know, this population is a smaller population, but I, I know there's a lot of. Tips for adults. Um, what you can do when your communication is compromised, but all of these steps aren't necessarily going to help our younger kids.
[00:25:28] So if you're not at a literate reading level yet, you're not going to benefit from the suggestion that CDC has said with captioning, we're writing things down. And so how do we kind of come to what you said, like meet in the middle. Um, with some of the safety and then the accommodation piece of all of this too.
[00:25:52] So, and then you did mention something about isolation too. Have you. Thought about when they go back to school again, that physical distancing and mask. If, if students are going to be required to wear a mask, and I know I've heard different things, they might have mask breaks depending on. Where they're at, but at that point, they're going to be further apart from each other.
[00:26:20] So, uh, and our lunchtime, that's going to be looking a lot different too, but I think so much of a bowing to school. And the reason we want kids to go back to school is because we want them to be in community with each other and they learn better that way. So how do we make sure that they're included that way?
[00:26:44] You know, I was watching a group of students, um, in a summer recreation program and in the town where I am. And, um, as part of the program, they've included COVID education. And these were kids probably from age five to 12, every single one wore a mask. And I began, you know, it occurs to me that. Do you want to be like everybody else?
[00:27:12] So if everybody's wearing a mask, you don't want to be the only one, not wearing a mask. So I don't think getting kids to wear a mask is going to be a problem. But I do think it is important to have times when they can remove the mask. And obviously eating will be one of them. Um, cause I think they need to learn what these.
[00:27:32] Covert accommodations are just in general, but I think kids are more resilient than we think. And, um, and I, I know there's social, the social pressure to be like, everybody else is great. And if it's just the role, you know, we've heard that, you know, well, you have to wear seatbelts. So we all wear our seatbelts.
[00:27:55] Um, and this is just the rule that we have for right now. And this is why, so. [00:28:00] I don't think the problem is going to be getting kids to wear masks. The problem is going to be communicating with the masks on, and I know of school districts where they have ordered clear masks for the entire elementary school population, because it's a school, that's a center based program for deaf and hard of hearing students at the elementary level.
[00:28:20] So, you know, I don't remember how many kids, 20, 25 kids they have, but spread out across grades. But, um, Yeah, that's just what the school decided they were going, going to do to honor communication access. But my, you know, not every school's there, it took some advocacy on the part of the teachers to make that, um, need known and they acted last spring so that they have the materials ready to go.
[00:28:48] When school opens in the fall, um, Yeah, there are shortages. So, you know, the ability to get things at the snap of a finger is just not going to be there. So, [00:29:00] um, the, the cleaning of the mask, cause I mean, there are kids that have other physical, um, Differences, um, with feeding and things like that. I mean that those severe needs kinds of kids have another set of another whole layer that is going to have to be addressed through special education.
[00:29:22] And, um, Know, they'll, it's just, then it's going to be more like, kind of the hospital situation where you're providing more care. Um, so it's different groups have, have I think different needs and are going to require different care. You know, we've heard about having kind of an isolation room at the school.
[00:29:41] So if a child comes to school and get sick, they have a place to go, you know, and these kids get sick. And if the parents are working half day home, Some somehow we're going to have to have things in place for families to have access to support services for those [00:30:00] situations. Right? Yeah. So another question I have, and I was wondering if you've talked to anyone since the hands and voices and being connected to different families, do any of the parents that you'd talked to, do they have an aid.
[00:30:19] Initial thoughts about whether they want their kids to go back to school or do they want them to do remote learning or hybrid? I mean, what are the thoughts about next steps or their choices? And when they're thinking about their own child with hearing loss, Um, I've not talked to that many specifically about going back to school, but I know that the accident issue is big.
[00:30:49] And, but I also know they realize that it's difficult decision and they, you know, want to have the, at least the clear masks. Used [00:31:00] by, you know, all kids and staff. Um, and I have heard a couple that said, you know, they've got family members with health issues and they just can't take the risk of having children back in school.
[00:31:11] And I think that's going to be true of everybody. We're going to have to have multiple options because of so many different risk issues and, you know, teachers who are at risk, what do we do when you're a teacher of the deaf. May, you know, had an autoimmune disease or something that they're compromised and, and can't be back in the classroom and there's going to be staffing issues around that.
[00:31:35] So you, you know, you don't have that many teachers of the deaf, how are you going to juggle? So I think there's a lot of decisions from both parents, from teachers, um, about how, how to make it safe to go back. Um, and so they're, you know, those are situations that. You know, families may just choose to keep their kids in remote.
[00:31:56] Education. I think some families are so fearful and again, so many families have family members with some kind of health issue that they just feel safer having the kids at home, whether we'll see some sharing of kids with parents that are working and go to a friend's house, some of the part of the day for their school.
[00:32:19] I don't know. I don't know how those things will pan out, but, um, I think at time will tell when kids start going. Yeah. Back to school. If the numbers start changing and we may have to pivot really quickly in some areas where the numbers are high in other States, if the numbers are really, really low, maybe families will feel safer.
[00:32:41] About sending their kids back to school, but I think we just have to continue to be creative. Um, and, and, you know, again, that access issue is always, always paramount. Yeah. So as we kind of wrap up, I mean, we've talked a lot and I think our conversation could go on and on and on, because like you said, We're going to have to have plan a, B, C, D E, depending on the pivot point that we're at and how things change or new information comes about.
[00:33:19] If we have a hot spot or if a kid goes back to school and they realize like, I, this, even with the accommodations and supports that we're able to meet in the middle with, it's still not going to work out. Can we. Go back to virtual learning. And if we go back to virtual learning, what are the supports that we need there as well?
[00:33:40] So I think there's so many different moving parts. It's really hard to overwhelming really to wrap your head around. But I would love to just from our discussion, be able to maybe at least leave with some. Five tips or something that we know [00:34:00] right now would be helpful for professionals who are working with deaf and hard of hearing parents.
[00:34:08] So even students, themselves who might be listening today, what kinds of things maybe we could give us tips, uh, for reentering or however they're going back to school. Can you think of brainstorms, some temps that we could use? I have a couple. And then we'll let you add, um, access to peers, figuring out how to remotely.
[00:34:39] Have bring kids together and create some social interactions, um, using technology and making sure there's technology support for, for families at home. When, you know, we know that, you know, if you've got three kids in your family and they're all online learning at the same time, the bandwidth issues. 
[00:35:00] So how do we support technology?
[00:35:04] Um, And then the other one that I keep talking about is make sure there's visual access available in good lighting and, you know, just, just give teachers some tips. And I'm sure they're learning that now as they go into online education in a more formal way, how you get ready to accommodate your students, but then also what do we tell parents to get your child ready to learn?
[00:35:28] So that. Um, when kids do come to the table to learn, it can be active. I think so having very structured individual lesson plans so that we, um, keep kids stimulated. One of the things that we heard I heard last spring is the kids were getting bored of online education and, um, that's. That's a fact that, you know, we have to deal with, especially if they're going to increase the number of hours, the kids.
[00:35:59] Have to be online. So there's a couple of, what do you think? I think, um, one of the things that you mentioned earlier, the students need to be part of this solution. So I think that is another really important part that we don't want to forget about because they have a lot of good ideas and they're living it every day and what we might think.
[00:36:24] Might not really impact them or something that is impacting them. We might not have thought about. So, and I think, again, this is another opportunity for us to build up their self advocacy skills and their self determination skills. And we always talk about that, and this is a real life. Opportunity to be creative and set goals and try them out and they don't work.
[00:36:53] What else can we do to make it work and coming up with a lot of solutions that way. So I think working really, again, thinking about that whole team, but making sure that student is, is the cornerstone of that team. Excellent. Yes. Yes. So they quit. I had a lot of good conversation about the pandemic and all of these unchartered waters that are coming up and I'm hoping as schools open up, maybe we can have another conversation because I think.
[00:37:34] When they do open up, we're going to have another eye opening, but what additional challenges that we haven't considered yet, and some additional solution that we haven't considered yet, and being able to come back around and talk about what worked and what didn't work and what can we try next to make sure that our students who are deaf and hard of hearing get the best access that they can given.
[00:38:03] The time that we're in right now. So I forgot to mention something that I would like to say. And that is the use of classroom, audio distribution systems for all children. When we think about a teacher masked and then the distance, um, and then the teacher trying to project their voice louder for kids to be able to hear there's going to be difficulty on the student and.
[00:38:31] With his speech intelligibility and voice fatigue on the part of the teacher, who's trying to project their voice. And one of the recommendations that I'd like to see is that all this is not for deaf and hard of hearing students. This is for all kids that they have access in their classrooms to a CAD system.
[00:38:52] And obviously if there is a deaf or hard of hearing students who uses FM. It would need to be able to be compatible. So you'd have to look at the manufacturer and some things like that. But anyway, I just, and especially if they're going to do more outside work, um, I think there's been a lot of talk about opening up and being outside more for classes, which is great, but that just adds another variable to the difficulty understanding what the teacher's saying.
[00:39:20] Right. And just to add onto that, if we are going to be physical distancing more, we might be setting up classrooms in a more, not acoustic environment, such as a GM or a common space that doesn't happen. You know, walls. So having a good signal to noise ratio is going to be really critical. Like you said, for all kids and our teacher, they're really going to be appreciating having that extra voice as well.
[00:39:51] So another more global tip for education. Yep. Access to auditory  information is really important. And I think what is it? 70% of what kids learn is through listening. So we want to make sure that they have the best access that they can when they're in that learning environment. So well, shale, I just want to say thank you for coming on today to the podcast.
[00:40:23] And I hope all of our listeners learned something or were inspired and had some different brainstorming ideas that are coming about for them as their own districts open up, because I know everybody seems to be having a different plan as they open up. And there's a lot of. Way and challenges as we do open up.
[00:40:46] So I think we just need to stay positive and be creative and be able to support one another so that when we do open up. Well all there together to figure this out. And I think we do need to do part two, come a couple months from now and say, Oh my gosh, that was the worst idea there ever was. And look at, we learned, well, I going to be inviting you back for part two.
[00:41:17] As we opened back up and figured out what we learned and what we need to do, definitely. Great. Well, thank you. It's been delightful. Well, thank you. So have a great evening. This has been a production of the 3C Digital Media Network. .