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Originally Posted by deafdyke
Very cool....did you grow up without sign or what? What kind of educational placement were you in?
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I learned sign language at Gallaudet until I was three and my family moved to Kansas. I spoke my first word at the age of 2, and my parents understood what I said because I signed it at the same time I spoke it.
I was placed in a mainstream environment in a school district that was progressive enough to have its own deaf/hoh/hi program that ensured all of us were receiving the same level of treatment and education (i.e. making sure that we learned, instead of 'dumbing it down' for us), and a close-knit community of families who had children that were also deaf/hoh/hi and mainstreamed. We all had interpreters in every single class, even for those of us who were in the gifted program as well. I took speech therapy until third grade, and to this day I still have people telling me that they cannot believe I'm hearing impaired because of how well I speak.
I just can't sing a good note to save my life.
I cannot stress the excellence of the school district I attended (Shawnee Mission School District.)