The boy is really focusing on what he hears right now. (I have never worried about his hearing.)
He pauses, then says "I hear something in my ears..." This means we have to identify the noise. So I have to stop filtering the background noise, focus on it, and figure out what sound he is paying attention to. I listed a bunch of things the other day, none of which were right.
"It goes 'ti ti'" he said, as I figured it out. "Oh, it's the clock," I said, pointing, where he can see the second hand move with each tick. He was very pleased.
He also hears babies crying. At the store I mentioned that usually means the baby is sad. So now when he hears a baby cry, he tells me, "You hear that baby cry? That baby is sad. I not sad. I happy!"
