The sounds of success

4-year-old’s hearing improves with help of Pittsburgh hearing and speech school

By Micaiah Wise, Sentinel reporter, mwise@lewistownsentinel.com
YEAGERTOWN — During a weekend visit to Yeagertown, Tyana Ridley sits on her grandfather’s lap watching cartoons.

Several months ago, hearing the television characters or her grandfather’s voice was a challenge for the 4-year-old. Born deaf, Tyana has worn hearing aids since she was 7 months old.

But thanks to support from the community and the Yeagertown Lions Club, today Tyana attends DePaul School for Hearing and Speech in Pittsburgh, where she lives with her mother, Cristy Moyer.

Tyana has attended the school for four months, after the family moved from Yeagertown. Tyana attends the preschool/toddler program seven hours a day, five days a week, like a normal school, Moyer said.

Moyer said that she has seen such an improvement in her daughter since they moved to Pittsburgh.

“The difference in Tyana since she started school is amazing!” Moyer said.

Before attending the school, Tyana did not know where the sounds came from or what they meant, her mother explained.

Now, Tyana understands simple phrases like “turn off the TV” or “get your shoes,” her mother explained.

“She says a lot only I understand,” her mother explained, but the first goal is for her to be more vocal. “... The pronunciation of words will come later.”

When Tyana hears airplanes, dogs, cars and other things that make noise, she points to her ear to let her mother know she hears it, Moyer said.

Like other children her age, she can make animal noises. At school, she is learning to write her name and identify colors.

“Tyana loves going to school and is always excited to show me what she has done that day,” Moyer said.

Tyana, with her curly black hair and big smile, was chosen to be placed on a billboard to advertise the school’s 100th anniversary, Moyer said.

“I picked her up from school one day, and her teacher asked, ‘Do you care if we put her on a billboard?’”

Moyer agreed and weeks later saw her daughter’s image on seven billboards across the city.

The school is teaching Tyana to use the ability she has to hear through a chochlear implant in her left ear and a hearing aid in her right, her mother explained. “... but even with the aid she cannot hear very much...”

This month, the family will meet with a surgeon to discuss the possibility of having an implant in her right ear, Moyer said.

“I talked with other parents at the school,” she said. After their children had the second implant, something clicked, Moyer said.

Mother and daughter still work closely together, spending almost two hours each night on homework, Moyer said.

Homework for the family is games. For example, Moyer will take Tyana’s baby doll, motion a yawn and say, “The baby’s sleepy.” Tyana then takes the baby, lays it down and covers it with a blanket, showing that she understands.

Moyer, too, has found success in her new home, with an apartment and a new job.

At first, the family considered living in Pittsburgh only until Tyana is able to be mainstreamed into a public school, but now Moyer said she plans for them to stay in the city.

The move to the city and Tyana’s implant would not have been possible without the support of the Yeagertown Lions Club, Moyer said. “I’d like to thank everyone who helped us ... because it means an awful lot.”

“Moving was the best thing for us,” Moyer said. “If not for sending her to school, she wouldn’t be where she is.”