Support for children who are deaf/hard of hearing, vision impaired, or multi-sensory impaired

What support your child can get

A child who is deaf/hard of hearing or vision impaired, living or being educated in the borough, can be referred to us for specialist support.

We:

• provide specialist advice to parents and teaching staff to help children with sensory impairments access their education and maximise their development

• support the use and maintenance of specialist technology including hearing aids, cochlear implants, remote microphone systems, braillers, magnifiers etc

• support child development; offer home visits for pre-school children

• write reports for Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs)

• work with other professionals, including audiologists and ophthalmologists, Speech and Language Therapists, Educational Psychologists, Special Educational Needs Advisors, Portage Specialists, Habilitation Specialists

• link families with voluntary agencies such as Guide Dogs UK (for Vision Impairment) or National Deaf Children’s Society (for Deaf/hard of hearing)

• offer an Under 5s group for deaf/hard of hearing childre maintain a register of children with Certificates of Sight Impairment/Severe Sight Impairment and can tell you if you are eligible to register and what the benefits are 

How your child can get the support they need

Make a referral

Parents/families, health professionals, early years settings and schools can all refer children (aged from babies to teenagers in full-time education) to us for specialist support.

Before you refer a child to us, you need to have:

• a diagnosis of hearing loss/deafness from an audiology clinic, or a diagnosis of vision impairment from an ophthalmology professional
• parental consent for the referral     

Screening and assessing referrals

Referrals are screened by a senior teacher who will allocate the relevant team member: a Qualified Teacher of the Deaf (QTOD), a Qualified Teacher of Children with Vision Impairment (QTVI) or a Qualified Teacher of Children with Multi-Sensory Impairment (QTMSI) who will assess the level of support needed.

We will carry out an assessment to decide if we can offer you support.

If you refer a child to us who has a mild sensory impairment, or conditions such as one-sided deafness or monocular vision, we may send you advice, rather than offering in-person visits, unless there are concerns around access to learning.