Dr. Tina Childress
Tina Childress, Au.D., CCC-A is an educational audiologist in the mainstream and residential school settings. She is also an award-winning presenter, adjunct lecturer, mentor for children and adults, and is active on various local, state and national Boards and Committees as well as social media. As a late-deafened adult with bilateral cochlear implants and who is fluent in ASL, she is able to seamlessly navigate between the Deaf and Hearing worlds. Her areas of expertise include assistive technology for visual and auditory communicators, advocacy to promote accessibility in venues such as the performing arts and virtual conference platforms, apps and psychosocial adjustment to hearing loss. Dr. Childress has created numerous online resources on a variety of technology and accessibility-related subjects in an effort to help individuals who are Deaf/Hard of Hearing connect to the world around them. Her resources can be found at http://TinaChildressAuD.com.
Presentation(s)
My life as a Communication Engineer
Those of us that work with Deaf/Hard of Hearing students may have different titles - audiologist, speech-language therapist, Teacher of the Deaf/Hard of Hearing. I've recently been calling myself a "Communication Engineer" because that's what we do. Right? We see communication breakdowns and we engineer solutions to help our students thrive. I'll be illustrating my thoughts and retrospective observations from my own personal journey with hearing loss including insight into technologies that have helped me navigate this world and advocacy tools that I have used to achieve effective access.
Objectives:
- Describe how codeswitching and functional/situational identity are intermeshed
- List two ways to improve accessibility in your office space
- Describe two examples of assistive technology for use in the community
Simple Language for Complex Topics
Have you ever been at a loss for words for explaining an audiogram? Do you see parents’ or other teachers’ eyes glaze over when you’re trying to explain how equipment works and why it’s so important? The purpose of this workshop is to not only provide you with a refresher and update for contemporary topics in audiology and deaf education but provide you with tools to explain it in everyday terms when you can’t come up with the words yourself. If there’s a concept that you’re stuck on, be sure to jot it down so we can discuss!
Objectives:
- Describe how hearing works without using jargon
- Describe how to interpret an audiogram without using jargon
- List two DHH resources that are parent-friendly