Question
My daughter Danielle was diagnosed with profound bilateral hearing loss at one month of age. She was implanted at 10 months. She hears the grass grow. Her receptive speech is about age appropriate, expressive is improving everyday. Danielle has turned two
Answer
Recent published studies demonstrate that some implanted children are learning two spoken languages very well. Successful bilingual learners demonstrate some characteristics that your daughter, Danielle, shares, including very early age at implantation, good speech perception skills with the device, and exposure to rich and complex models of the two spoken languages. The latter is a critical factor, and because your family is multi-lingual, you are able to provide Danielle with excellent language models.
My advice is that your family speak both English and Russian to Danielle, as you have been doing. From your report, it is clear that she is learning both languages, so let her be your guide on this. Just be sure of two things: Utilize good techniques of "clear speech" and language modeling with Danielle, as you would with any child who has a hearing loss; and, carefully monitor her growth in both languages to ensure that she continues to make progress at an acceptable rate.
Amy McConkey Robbins, M.S., CCC-Sp, is a speech-language pathologist in private practice who specializes in children with hearing loss and cochlear implants. She has published in numerous professional journals. Her current projects focus on children with implants who are bilingual, those with multiple disabilities and on the development of musical skills in this population.