Josselin Garcia

Josselin Garcia is an inspiring child from Honduras, Central America. She is profoundly deaf, and in the first 6 years of her life she had no opportunity to learn any language at all. She could only communicate with her family through pointing and family-developed gestures. In her kindergarten classroom in Honduras, she was afraid and all alone. Today Josselin has the language and skills to be able to attend school with her friends at All Saints Catholic Academy in Naperville, Illinois.

"This is Josselin"

Since January 2002 our Hubert family has served as Josselin’s legal guardians and her “temporary” family in the USA so she can learn language and receive an education. The goal of both our Hubert and Garcia families is for Josselin to learn the necessary skills to return to her country and society with the opportunity to live a fulfilling life.

The Huberts and the Garcias
"The Huberts & the Garcias"

Josselin is here in the USA through a foreign student visa. This visa allows her to study in the USA and to travel to visit her family in Honduras. Even though public schools in the USA would be required to serve her if we should ask, it is a violation of the federal immigration and visitor law for Josselin to use public education. If she were to attend a public school, she would lose her visa to be able to visit her family. Josselin must go to a private school that is approved by the Department of Homeland Security.

The costs of Josselin’s private special education have exceeded $100,000 plus the loss of one of the Hubert incomes for Greg to serve as a needed, full-time volunteer to help her. For the first several years, our Hubert family was able to cover costs through our savings and income. In the summer of 2005, we first began to seek financial aid to help Josselin. In December 2005, we had to take out a 2nd mortgage. Our lives have been blessed by Josselin and the help of others, and we are sustained by the belief that we will find the necessary support and referrals to others who can help.

We first "met" Josselin through the mail in April 1999 when we received her information from the child sponsorship organization Children, Incorporated. One of our sponsored children had left her project in Mexico, and we had agreed to sponsor a child at a new project in Honduras in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch.

When we read that Josselin was deaf, we first tried to help her family to get audiology services for her in Honduras. When we were unsuccessful, we brought Josselin and her mother Flor de Maria to the USA to go to our daughter Nicole’s audiology center at Carle Foundation Hospital. We knew Josselin would be able to receive the highest quality hearing aids and some initial training to help her begin to listen.

When we found out that even the most powerful hearing aids didn’t help, we began work on a plan to get Josselin a cochlear implant like our daughter Nicole. With a surgery scheduled for December 6, 2001, 6 ½ year-old Josselin returned to the USA with both her father Ricardo and her mother Flor de Maria. During the pre-op testing, we found out that Josselin has no cochlea and no auditory nerve. She could not benefit from an implant.

Ricardo and Flor de Maria shared their fears for their daughter’s future when they would no longer be able to care for her. They shared concerns about the societal treatment of the handicapped in their country. They also shared their dreams that Josselin would one day be able to talk, just like they had seen Greg’s own deaf mother speak and read lips.

Greg's Deaf Parents & Josselin
"Greg's deaf parents with Greg and Josselin"

We searched for an oral (spoken language) school for the deaf to help Josselin, but we found out that the oral schools have changed in whom they serve. They have now become auditory-oral schools in both name and practice. They now specialize in helping the young children who benefit from hearing technology, like our daughter Nicole did.

If you are either a child who is unable to benefit from hearing technology or a child who is older and severely-language delayed, the auditory-oral schools are unable to help you. Even the school that had taught Greg’s mother turned Josselin away with the words "we have no placement for this child". The resources and the attention of the oral advocates have shifted to the tremendous potential offered by technology in conjunction with early detection through newborn hearing screening.

Josselin’s family believed that sign language was not an option for her to be successful in her country. With sign language, the goal is non-verbal communication among those who can sign. Average literacy skills in the USA for those who sign are reported to be a 5th grade level or lower after completion of high school. Josselin also needed to be able to learn Spanish. Due to the requirements of a student visa, the option also had to include an approved private school. We couldn’t even consider teaching her in our home, because home schooling is explicitly excluded by the federal student visa law.

"Josselin and her Papa - Mr. Garcia"

We found one private school that could initially help Josselin through a visual tool called Cued Speech. Cued Speech is not very well known, and it is not well accepted by many educators of the deaf regardless of whether they are advocates of spoken language or sign language. Although Cued Speech involves hand shapes and hand movements, it is not sign language.

Think of Cued Speech as a supplement to speech reading, also called lip reading. The hand shapes and hand movements accompany the mouth movements of speech in order to provide visual access to the sounds (phonemes) of spoken language. Using Cued Speech, even a child who is profoundly deaf can learn the phonemes of spoken language in a manner that is analogous to learning through hearing.

Josselin and Greg traveled 3-4 hours a day so that Josselin would be able to learn language at the Alexander Graham Bell Montessori School (AGBMS) in the far northeast corner of Mount Prospect, Illinois. For a year and a half, Greg also served as a full-time volunteer for Alternatives in Education for the Hearing Impaired (AEHI) in an effort to raise awareness of Cued Speech as an option for other children, to recruit new students, and to help improve the financial condition of the school. During that time period, the AEHI organization owned and operated the AGBMS school.

"Josselin graduates from Alexander Graham Bell Montessori School (AGBMS)"

In less than one year with Cued Speech, Josselin began to read short-vowel readers like "Max the Cat" and "Fun with Gum". In two years, she had achieved a 4 ½ year age equivalent in her ability to understand spoken language. In three and a half years, she reached the language and academic level to begin the next step in her education.

In fall 2005 Josselin began 2nd grade in a mainstream neighborhood school, All Saints Catholic Academy. Greg joined her in the classroom as a full-time volunteer aid, and he continues to serve in a full-time volunteer role to help her.

"Josselin and Greg on the first Day at All Saints Acedemy"

We are in the middle of a long-term effort to help Josselin. She will continue her studies at All Saints until the summer of 2009. Then after 8 years in the USA, at the age of 14 she will return to Honduras where we will continue the language and academic effort with her family and private tutors.

Josselin had no language before she came to the USA. English is Josselin’s first and primary language to give her the opportunity to learn Spanish. Her language progress is greatly affected by the 6 years of language deprivation during which her brain missed out on language stimulation in the most critical period of childhood development.

Today she can learn words and phrases in Spanish, but she must reach an adequate level of English proficiency before we can give her in-depth training in Spanish. We believe she will reach a sufficient English proficiency level by her final year in the USA. The majority of her Spanish skills will be developed with private tutoring in Honduras.

One of the most amazing things to see is Josselin’s ability to connect language with memories in her life before she had any language at all. When you read these following words, think about the miracle that is happening inside her brain. We are so blessed to be a part of this courageous child’s life.

March 23, 2006

When I was 5 or 4 years old I went to school in Honduras. My mama and my papa took me to school. My mama and my papa know me. They know I can’t hear and I can’t talk.

I was afraid because I was alone and my friends did not say “Hi” to me. They did not know my name. They were mean to me.

I did not hear what my teacher said. She was mad at me because I did not play with my friends. I bit my teacher’s hand. She was mad at me.

I went to find my house and see my family. I was out of school. My teacher told my mama and my papa about me. The [sic] were mad at me.

My mama and papa took me to another school. My new friends said “Hi”. My new friends are waving at me because they are my new friends. I wave to them. Now I am happy because they are not mean to me.

I think my mama or papa told them about my name. I can’t write the words on the paper. My mama and papa took me to Illinois. My mama and papa told Greg and Shelley to help me talk the words. And Greg and Shelley helped me to write the words on the paper.

The End

dream to speak website, for children that speak cute speech