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Background
Listening Environment in School 3
In the Swedish school system there is a distinction between schools for the
deaf run by the state and schools for hard-of-hearing pupils run by local
authorities (municipalities). The educational language in schools for the deaf
is sign language, whilst in schools for the hard-of-hearing it is spoken
Swedish. The focus for this study is five local schools that provide classes for
hard-of-hearing pupils. These schools have an average number of seven to
eight pupils per class, and offer acoustically adapted classrooms with
technical equipment, e.g. hearing loops. Two different microphones can be
used with hearing loops: either a wireless and flexible conference system with
the microphone placed in the middle of the table, or an individual
microphone with a locked position at each desk. The desk alternative can
be controlled with a mechanical on/off button (the traditional system) or by
voice (see www.rnid.org.uk). Sign language is taught as a subject once or
twice a week. This is not to be compared with a bilingual situation, since most
of the pupils and teachers are unable to use the language fluently. In classes
for hard-of-hearing pupils there is a need for the use of hearing aids 1 in the
environment as well as, on occasion, the use of signs from sign language in
addition to speaking.
This study originated during the school improvement project mentioned
earlier, in which teachers tried to change the learning environment for
hard-of-hearing pupils in order to promote a more dialogue-oriented
and participatory classroom communication. The traditional technological
solutions had contributed to an inflexible arrangement of furniture in
the classroom. The desks were positioned in the shape of a half circle and
linked together with wires for individual desk microphones. The teacher
used a wireless microphone whilst the desk microphones for the pupils
were supposed to be turned on and off manually when each pupil wished
to speak. When pupils did not activate their microphones, this also
prevented other pupils from listening via the hearing loop. In order
not to risk a misunderstanding, pupils preferred to speak to the teacher
rather than to their classmates, which led to a relatively passive approach
amongst pupils in the classroom (Ahlström & Preisler 1998). One
might say that in such classrooms the teacher significantly controlled
the classroom communication. In a description of the improvement
process mentioned above, a very experienced teacher expressed the following
view:
1 Hearing aids are personal aids that can have three different settings (m, t and m/t).
. Microphone (m)-setting: The microphone of the hearing aid picks up and amplifies the sound
(speech and background sound).
. Telecoil (t)-setting: A hearing loop is used to amplify and transmit to the hearing aid what
pupils close to the desk microphone are saying; the background noise is cut off.
. Microphone/telecoil (m/t)-setting: The microphone and the hearing loop amplify and transmit
the sound at the same time. Very few pupils have this setting on their hearing aid.