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I could try to find a deaf girl. However, I don’t want my kids to have an increased chance of deafness. This sounds like a classic case of premature optimisati

I could try to find a deaf girl. However, I don’t want my kids to have an increased chance of deafness. This sounds like a classic case of premature optimisation. Cross that bridge when you get there. Thousands of other deaf parents have done so. Their kids were fine. Even if they come out hearing, we’d need to make sure they’re raised right — who will teach them how to talk? Let me respectfully suggest that this is just untrue, a persistent myth about language learning. Hearing kids learn spoken language just fine, even if their parents don't use it. (Parents have a natural tendency to overemphasise the percentage of the time that their kids spend listening only to them. ;) But kids listen to everyone.) One thing that does happen is that hearing kids of deaf parents become fluent in both ASL and a spoken language. Which is not a problem. It is in fact kind of awesome.

thunfischbrot 14y ago
> This sounds like a classic case of premature optimisation. My thoughts exactly. Before I was forced to admit that I cuold use less technical terms when describing social or psychological phenomena ;)
bad_user 14y ago
One thing that does happen is that hearing kids of deaf parents become fluent in both ASL and a spoken language This also happens inside families that migrated to another country. The parents do not speak the foreign language withing the walls of their own house (the foreign language being an inconvenience for them), but that doesn't stop the children from being very fluent in both languages from a very young age.
- devolve 14y ago
  As a person who was raised with two different household languages at different times, I can offer anecdotal evidence that this holds true. My refugee parents decided that their native language (Romanian) would be an obstacle for me in their new country (Thailand) and went for English instead. Then we got asylum in Sweden and I learned Swedish in kindergarten and so on. In Sweden my parents started speaking Romanian at home, which I also picked up. It became a coherent triangle of languages, where home we spoke Romanian, outside of home Swedish, and English on TV and in school.
  - tocomment 14y ago
    So you learned English from TV? I thought I've always heard that didn't work.
    - devolve 14y ago
      No. I learned English at home, and I kept up with it through TV and school. Also, I've always preferred to read in English, which probably helped a lot.
    - warp 14y ago
      I learned most of my early english from TV. I grew up in the Netherlands, speaking Frisian at home and Dutch at school. At the time dutch tv did not offer much programming aimed at children, the more interesting cartoons to be found on cable tv were on english language channels. I would tape Transformers episodes and watch them over and over. Later on I started consuming other media (video games + video game magazines, american comics), so that by the time they started teaching english to me at school I was already relatively fluent.
    - screwt 14y ago
      A Dutch friend of mine said watching English-language TV was a great help learning english. Just hearing the language a lot does wonders for recognising the sounds of words. Plus she said a lot of shows would have Dutch subtitles, so you get the link between sound & meaning.
    - nessus42 14y ago
      An ex-girlfriend of mine moved to the US from Romania at the age of ten without any knowledge of English. As an adult she speaks completely fluent English with no hint of an accent. She claims that she learned English by watching TV. Though of course, she was also living in a country where most people speak English, so I'm sure that must have helped. I'll have to ask her how long it was before she started school again, and how well she understood English by that point.
      - bad_user 14y ago
sarenji 14y ago
This sounds like a classic case of premature optimisation. Cross that bridge when you get there. Thousands of other deaf parents have done so. Their kids were fine. Actually, you're right. Sometimes the girl I like is deaf, sometimes not. I should be fine with kids either way, and put in the work to make sure they develop right. I'm rethinking this entire paragraph. Perhaps I should have said I don't specifically search for a girl who is deaf, and then just left it at that, or just removed it entirely. Love is love. Let me respectfully suggest that this is just untrue, a persistent myth about language learning. Hearing kids learn spoken language just fine, even if their parents don't use it. Some (old) studies had suggested otherwise, but you made me remember the bilingualism argument, which is gaining traction. I do know that if you have a hearing child to both deaf parents, it's very important to expose the child to spoken language as much as possible. Of course, I hope I'm that kind of parent :-) Bilingual kids do have a lot of advantages over kids who only know one language. I'd be very happy to teach my child, hearing or deaf, both sign and English. Thanks for the insightful comment.
- hef19898 14y ago
  First, non of what I'll be writting is an offense of any kind, I'm just putting it first because a) my other language isn't english 2) it's a sesitive subject and 3) it's awritten communication - annonymous. You are right, love is love. And one thing I learned, never argue with it! Never! So secondly, I don't think there is anything wrong with premature optimisation, everybody wants their kids to be allright and, yes, normal. If they are not, you still love them and you can't predict it anyhow but I completely understand if you want to reduce risks. since I was faced with a similar decision myself (thank god my genes turned out ok), my girl-friend and I decided to go for it. Exactly because we wanted our kids to be allright. And as for the rest of your post: you opened my eyes on a subject I never really thought about, thank you very much for that!
- idleloops 14y ago
  Yeah I think you could remove that section entirely.
- ataggart 14y ago
  As a hearing child of two deaf parents, I'm one data point against the notion that such a child's language skills are harmed. Sesame Street is a wonderful thing.
deleted 14y ago
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thunfischbrot 14y ago

> This sounds like a classic case of premature optimisation. My thoughts exactly. Before I was forced to admit that I cuold use less technical terms when describing social or psychological phenomena ;)

bad_user 14y ago

One thing that does happen is that hearing kids of deaf parents become fluent in both ASL and a spoken language This also happens inside families that migrated to another country. The parents do not speak the foreign language withing the walls of their own house (the foreign language being an inconvenience for them), but that doesn't stop the children from being very fluent in both languages from a very young age.

devolve 14y ago
As a person who was raised with two different household languages at different times, I can offer anecdotal evidence that this holds true. My refugee parents decided that their native language (Romanian) would be an obstacle for me in their new country (Thailand) and went for English instead. Then we got asylum in Sweden and I learned Swedish in kindergarten and so on. In Sweden my parents started speaking Romanian at home, which I also picked up. It became a coherent triangle of languages, where home we spoke Romanian, outside of home Swedish, and English on TV and in school.
- tocomment 14y ago
  So you learned English from TV? I thought I've always heard that didn't work.
  - devolve 14y ago
    No. I learned English at home, and I kept up with it through TV and school. Also, I've always preferred to read in English, which probably helped a lot.
  - warp 14y ago
    I learned most of my early english from TV. I grew up in the Netherlands, speaking Frisian at home and Dutch at school. At the time dutch tv did not offer much programming aimed at children, the more interesting cartoons to be found on cable tv were on english language channels. I would tape Transformers episodes and watch them over and over. Later on I started consuming other media (video games + video game magazines, american comics), so that by the time they started teaching english to me at school I was already relatively fluent.
  - screwt 14y ago
    A Dutch friend of mine said watching English-language TV was a great help learning english. Just hearing the language a lot does wonders for recognising the sounds of words. Plus she said a lot of shows would have Dutch subtitles, so you get the link between sound & meaning.
  - nessus42 14y ago
    An ex-girlfriend of mine moved to the US from Romania at the age of ten without any knowledge of English. As an adult she speaks completely fluent English with no hint of an accent. She claims that she learned English by watching TV. Though of course, she was also living in a country where most people speak English, so I'm sure that must have helped. I'll have to ask her how long it was before she started school again, and how well she understood English by that point.
    - bad_user 14y ago

sarenji 14y ago

This sounds like a classic case of premature optimisation. Cross that bridge when you get there. Thousands of other deaf parents have done so. Their kids were fine. Actually, you're right. Sometimes the girl I like is deaf, sometimes not. I should be fine with kids either way, and put in the work to make sure they develop right. I'm rethinking this entire paragraph. Perhaps I should have said I don't specifically search for a girl who is deaf, and then just left it at that, or just removed it entirely. Love is love. Let me respectfully suggest that this is just untrue, a persistent myth about language learning. Hearing kids learn spoken language just fine, even if their parents don't use it. Some (old) studies had suggested otherwise, but you made me remember the bilingualism argument, which is gaining traction. I do know that if you have a hearing child to both deaf parents, it's very important to expose the child to spoken language as much as possible. Of course, I hope I'm that kind of parent :-) Bilingual kids do have a lot of advantages over kids who only know one language. I'd be very happy to teach my child, hearing or deaf, both sign and English. Thanks for the insightful comment.

hef19898 14y ago
First, non of what I'll be writting is an offense of any kind, I'm just putting it first because a) my other language isn't english 2) it's a sesitive subject and 3) it's awritten communication - annonymous. You are right, love is love. And one thing I learned, never argue with it! Never! So secondly, I don't think there is anything wrong with premature optimisation, everybody wants their kids to be allright and, yes, normal. If they are not, you still love them and you can't predict it anyhow but I completely understand if you want to reduce risks. since I was faced with a similar decision myself (thank god my genes turned out ok), my girl-friend and I decided to go for it. Exactly because we wanted our kids to be allright. And as for the rest of your post: you opened my eyes on a subject I never really thought about, thank you very much for that!
idleloops 14y ago
Yeah I think you could remove that section entirely.
ataggart 14y ago
As a hearing child of two deaf parents, I'm one data point against the notion that such a child's language skills are harmed. Sesame Street is a wonderful thing.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]