Closed Captioning for Children with Hearing Loss

CCHAT encourages families and fellow educators to find helpful accommodations for children with hearing loss. Making modifications to everyday situations can ensure children who are deaf and hard of hearing find success in all avenues of their lives.

One way to assist those with hearing loss is with the use of closed captioning. For children who can read, or who are learning to read, closed captioning serves as a valuable tool at home and even in the classroom.

What is Closed Captioning?

Closed captioning is a visual representation of sounds being produced in a video or by a speaker. The words spoken by a person or sounds emitted appear in written form on a screen. This is most commonly seen in television shows, when closed captioning creates a running dialogue that viewers can read as the show goes on.

Where is Closed Captioning Used?

In addition to television shows, closed captioning can be used with other entertainment modes such as movies, YouTube videos and streaming services. Closed captioning is also a considerable benefit in places like airports and hospitals, where important announcements produced over a speaker system translate to readable words being displayed on a video screen. 

Closed captioning can also be of use within education settings, and it is not just utilized by children with hearing loss. All students can benefit from closed captioning in order to follow the dialogue of a teacher or professor. In these cases, transcribed words would appear on a video board or projection screen within the classroom, and most often the closed captioning is produced digitally by a computer program. 

The Benefits of Closed Captioning for Children with Hearing Loss

For children with hearing loss, sound quality and reception is always a priority. In cases where sound quality may be negatively affected or volume may be lower than desired, closed captioning serves as an equalizer. Missed words can be filled in for the listener with the running text, ensuring that no information is lost. 

This benefit typically manifests within a classroom setting. Children who are deaf and hard of hearing can follow lessons, directions and classroom activities through the use of closed captioning when sound is harder to pick up. Closed captioning can improve focus, information retention and engagement in academics. 

For children who are not yet reading or who are currently learning to read, closed captioning can serve as a developmental tool. Turning on closed captioning at home during television shows or movies can help children begin recognizing words, build word sounds and develop broader vocabularies. 

Closed Captioning and Helping Your Child Succeed

In most cases, turning on available closed captioning is easy. For entertainment like TV, YouTube and streaming services, closed captioning can be readily found on the menu bar. If you are looking for closed captioning within a classroom, speak with your educational team, including the teacher, to see what options are available to you. 

CCHAT aims to equip families with a host of resources to ensure long-term success and happiness for children with hearing loss. For more ways to help your child who is deaf or hard of hearing succeed in an educational setting, read our blog, Assistive Technology for Children with Hearing Loss in the Classroom.