Structure
The Hear For You program consists of:
- Meet & Greet / Information Session
- E-Mentoring using online one-to-one communication
- Session for parents of participants
The program is tailored for three age-specific groups:
Each group will have a male and female mentor.
Hear For You accepts a maximum of 6-8 students per group. The student-to-mentor ratio is kept low to ensure students can participate fully in group discussions and to enable the mentors to spend quality time with each participant.
Program Duration
Each group participates in three workshops spread over two school terms. These workshops, presented by an even gender split of mentors, are held on a Sunday during school term from 10.30 am to 3.30 pm. A five week gap between each workshop allows time for a break and E-Mentoring. Please check our program timetable for 2013.
E-Mentoring
Between workshops, the participants keep in contact with their mentor via online chat. The participants are given topics at the workshops to take home to think about and discuss online with their mentor. This also gives them an opportunity to discuss any relevant issues with their mentor privately or away from the group workshops.
Through these e-mentoring activities, participants will also learn about the responsible use of technology. All this is accomplished safely online.
Parents Session
It takes a team effort to make the mentoring program successful. Parents are an important part of the team – their trust, support and commitment complement the mentoring program.
The purpose of hosting a session for parents of participants is to give them the opportunity to get to know the mentors, to discuss any relevant issues and to develop a combined support network.
The mentors will deliver a presentation about the group workshops. We will mention relevant activities that were involved in promoting different skills and what it is hoped the participants will learn from each workshop.
We will also speak to the parents about our own personal experiences and any barriers we felt were associated with our deafness and how we dealt with them. We will give teenage advice for parents to pass on, while mentioning some of the strengths we have developed along the way.
We will invite hearing people to speak about their experience of being married to and living with a deaf person. This is particularly useful for parents as it gives them insight into this future stage and will hopefully give reassurance about future relationships.
We will also give parents copies of life experiences written specially by a number of hearing people who have a variety of relationships with individual mentors. The aim is to provide the participants and their parents with further insight from these different perspectives. It will also help the younger ones feel more positive about their hearing loss.
