Lipreading

Learning to Lipread

Lipreading is seeing the sound of speech - it is not like reading a book - you do not see every word. In fact, only about 30% of words have some sort of shape on the lips, but we do not worry about this because there are plenty of other clues to help us.

As soon as anyone with a hearing loss arrives anywhere, they need to find out immediately the subject of the conversation - then they are in with a chance. Once you know the gist of something you can use your common sense and natural intelligence to help you work out the parts you cannot Lipread.

Lipreaders find anticipation very helpful, they also put 2 and 2 together; if they can Lipread part of a sentence, they can often work out the rest.

Everybody uses facial expressions and body language often without realising they are doing so. To Lipreaders these can give vital clues whether someone is happy, sad, cross, in a hurry, bored or feeling unwell etc.

This is just a brief résumé of some of the skills that people with hearing loss learn and practice when they attend Lipreading classes. Apart from acquiring these skills, hard of hearing people also benefit and gain support from being with others who are facing the same day to day difficulties.

Join a Lipreading class;
they are fun and informative, and life-enhancing in the truest sense.
Maggie Short - Tutor, Member of ATLA

Read more about the classes from the links .......