State Exam Accommodations For Deaf Students
Friday, June 11th, 2010State exams are stressful enough for any family, but especially when the exam candidate is deaf. Parents worry that their teen will not understand an exam question due to underdeveloped language comprehension, or simply be unable to complete an exam in time.
IDK recently learned of a student who is taking the Junior Certificate exams at [...]
Summer Sailing In Dublin For Kids With Disabilities
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010Kids aged 8 to 17 with disabilities, are invited by the Irish Sailing Association and Disability Federation of Ireland to learn to sail in Dublin this summer.
A ‘taster’ session will be held on Sunday, June 20, at 10.30am in Dun Laoghaire Marina, after which interested kids can enroll for five Sundays of sailing from June [...]
Infant Literacy Skills – Newborn To Three Years
Tuesday, April 27th, 2010Children need to develop literacy skills before their first day of school and research consistently shows children learn literacy skills even before talking.
Emergent literacy theorists believe that children start learning about literacy (reading and writing) from birth. Infants can learn about the letters of the alphabet and concepts of print long before they are able [...]
Future Arts 2010: Interview With LifeFM in Cork
Wednesday, April 21st, 2010On April 8, 2010, Anna Daly from Cork radio station LifeFM talked with IDK’s Miriam Walsh, an attendee at the Arts Council’s Future Arts conference in Dublin from March 27-29, 2010. A podcast of this interview will be posted here asap. IDK’s Caroline Carswell also wrote an arts inclusion advisory for administrators after the [...]
Deafness Led To The Phone, Internet & SMS Texts
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010Deafness had a key role in the invention of the phone, the internet and SMS texting. As voting for Ireland’s Net Visionary Awards gets under way, Miriam Walsh explains the link to each technology.
Would you consider deafness in any way to have influenced the telephone, Internet and SMS texting as everyday tools for communication? Most [...]
IDK & Special Stories in The Sunday Business Post
Tuesday, April 6th, 2010The Sunday Business Post recently interviewed Kate Gaynor from Special Stories and IDK’s Caroline Carswell about their book, “A Birthday For Ben”.
The two-page feature in the SBP’s Agenda Magazine can be read as two colour pages (PDF files): (1) Page 24 (2) Page 25 or as a simple webpage.
Parent Question: Is Home Tuition in Irish Funded?
Wednesday, March 31st, 2010This question is highlighted after a comment on the IDK website, so other parents can add their points if wished. Students & parents discuss the issue on the IDK forum, in one of the most-read posts.
Hi, my son is 9 years old. He has a severe hearing loss in both ears and attends mainstream [...]
Including Deaf Children At Preschool – Part Two
Thursday, February 25th, 2010This post continues the piece, Including Deaf Children At Preschool (Part One). A key question was put to the mum & creche manager:
How did you identify the potential challenges you (mum & creche) might meet during Charlie’s early days there?
(The Mum)
Once Charlie’s deafness was confirmed, we understood that communication methods had to be adjusted. He [...]
IDK Wins At Ireland’s eGovernment Awards 2010
Friday, February 19th, 2010At the eighth annual Ireland’s eGovernment Awards ceremony today in Dublin, IDK beat off stiff competition to win the Education category.
The awards, presented in association with Eircom, aim to “raise awareness and recognise the innovators, developers, forward thinkers and experts who are pioneering the changes happening in how the Irish Government delivers services to its [...]
Including Deaf Children At Preschool – Part One
Monday, February 15th, 2010This spring, the Irish government rolls out its free preschool year for all children born between February 2, 2005 to June 30, 2006 (with exemptions for children with special needs). The Early Child Care & Education (ECCE) initiative, which is open to all preschools in Ireland, is profiled on IDK.
IDK will this week [...]