Back to the past...

Yesterday, Sunday, Lotte suddenly remembered one of the teachers (U.) of her previous kindergarten. This is one of the deaf teachers there, who can speak very well. Lotte asked if she could go to the kindergarten and meet her.. (The picture on the right is from the last days there.... march 2006)
So today, we called the kindergarten and asked if Lotte could visit. She was very welcome!

Arriving at the school, she remembered where she had played and walked. After all, it is only 1-1/2 years ago, but for Lotte, that is quite a lifetime.
We went inside, and she recognised the school. There are only a few teachers there from the time she has been there, so she was very shy.
But, when U. appeared, she lightened up.
But, even though U. speaks well, she uses sign all the time. It was obvious that Lotte did not follow it. She listened to the speech.
This was even more obvious when another teacher arrived on the scene. This teacher, M. is also deaf, but her speech is very distorted. Difficult to understand for us, but for Lotte is was very strange. She kept her distance from this teacher.

But it was good to see them again. Lotte had obviously grown a lot, and everyone was glad to see her. They still had a book that Lotte "forgot" when she left there, so U. and Lotte went to get it. It didn't leave Lotte's side from then on...

Going out, it was funny to see that Lotte was looking for her coat in the "usual" place from when she went to that school. Straight back into the old habits....

For us, we could see how good our decision has been to have Lotte in an all-hearing kindergarten. The contrast between the two schools are quite big. Obviously, it is difficult to predict where Lotte would have been had she still been going to the deaf/hoh/ci/hearing kindergarten.... but there is a strong feeling that the move was for the best.