Spoken English AND ASL, right?

[Interpretrator]

ASL grammar, I'm told, is similar to French.

In certain aspects, such as adjectives coming after nouns, yes.

RoyalGuard, Sweden has adopted a very progressive deaf education methodology where Swedish Sign Language is taught first, and spoken Swedish is taught as a second language. These children's test scores have improved dramatically. I can find the research for you if you need it.

I am hearing so do not have personal experience to bear on this, but the most linguistically flexible deaf people I know TEND (not a generalization, there are exceptions all over the place) to have learned ASL first, and then English as a second language. Please don't listen to the people who will tell you "your child will never learn to read" or "your child will never get along in the hearing world." This is UNTRUE. You are off to a great start, good luck with your child!

 

[rjr2006]

In certain aspects, such as adjectives coming after nouns, yes.

RoyalGuard, Sweden has adopted a very progressive deaf education methodology where Swedish Sign Language is taught first, and spoken Swedish is taught as a second language. These children's test scores have improved dramatically. I can find the research for you if you need it.

I am hearing so do not have personal experience to bear on this, but the most linguistically flexible deaf people I know TEND (not a generalization, there are exceptions all over the place) to have learned ASL first, and then English as a second language. Please don't listen to the people who will tell you "your child will never learn to read" or "your child will never get along in the hearing world." This is UNTRUE. You are off to a great start, good luck with your child!

if the child uses ASL DIRECTLY instead of learning ESL then he/she will have poor English skills. That is why I believe SEE/Oral/TC are best for your deaf child.

 

[rjr2006]

I understand why you are against SEE, but I had to learn English by the chosen sign language mode that my parents decided to teach me. You know what? hearing parents are against ASL and my mom felt weird when she was trying to do ASL in SEE mode, and she said that ASL is very crazy and she continues on using homemade signs and use real English.

please think of my quote and since you are hearing and have a DEAF child. If you want her to communicate with the hearing world, then go with SEE/oral and homemade signs

 

[Reba]

please think of my quote and since you are hearing and have a DEAF child. If you want her to communicate with the hearing world, then go with SEE/oral and homemade signs

"Homemade" signs limit communication to just the family members. If someone wants to communicate with the rest of the world, homemade signs won't work.

 

[Mookie]

I understand why you are against SEE, but I had to learn English by the chosen sign language mode that my parents decided to teach me. You know what? hearing parents are against ASL and my mom felt weird when she was trying to do ASL in SEE mode, and she said that ASL is very crazy and she continues on using homemade signs and use real English.

Oh boy. Have your mother sent to ASL Boot Camp....

 

[Mookie]

if the child uses ASL DIRECTLY instead of learning ESL then he/she will have poor English skills. That is why I believe SEE/Oral/TC are best for your deaf child.

Hello Young Lad,

I know you have different opinions since you are required to constantly communiate via your SEE method. Trust me, SEE method does not work very well for the mainstreamed deaf kids. That's why I had my high school GPA of 2.1. Why? I missed whole info in general classes that SEE interpeters could not finish whole message in a class for 50 minuates. I prefer ASL methods. Right now I am in MBA program that I fluent in ASL.

 

[rjr2006]

Hello Young Lad,

I know you have different opinions since you are required to constantly communiate via your SEE method. Trust me, SEE method does not work very well for the mainstreamed deaf kids. That's why I had my high school GPA of 2.1. Why? I missed whole info in general classes that SEE interpeters could not finish whole message in a class for 50 minuates. I prefer ASL methods. Right now I am in MBA program that I fluent in ASL.

a few days ago, I had an ASL ONLY interpreter and I kept telling her to slow down signs and I asked her to repeat the signs using finger spelling. God, I feel like I am not used to ASL, but I have to learn more ASL gestures and structure. i noticed that she constantly kept saying " ......... why? [reason here]..." instead of ".........., because [reason here]............"

My family members are not like that.

 

[Mookie]

a few days ago, I had an ASL ONLY interpreter and I kept telling her to slow down signs and I asked her to repeat the signs using finger spelling. God, I feel like I am not used to ASL, but I have to learn more ASL gestures and structure. i noticed that she constantly kept saying " ......... why? [reason here]..." instead of ".........., because [reason here]............"

My family members are not like that.

You need to be ready in deaf educational community soon. You will be ok, dont worry little buddy...

 

[signer16]

RoyalGuard, I know you are getting tons of information, and I applaud you for reaching out and looking into all the different options available. Your daughter is so luckily to have someone who cares.
When you get out and talk to most deaf people, through writing or speech, you will see that most have problems with English. This is because, as you now know, it is extremely difficult to learn a language based on PHONETICS when you can't hear. Whether or not one grows up using SEE or ASL, a deaf person is probably never going to grasp English as well as the average hearing person. Of course this can be more or less debated, but that is a basic truth.
As a hearing person, especially when I've been the student of deaf teachers, I have had the opportunity to gauge many deaf people's English skills. The deaf people I meet who can read and write the best are those who have deaf parents, and who used ASL as their first language. They have then approached English as a second language from the age of 5 or so in school, and been able to do quite well. Deaf kids with deaf parents have significantly higher test scores than deaf kids with hearing parents. This is because they were exposed to a complete language from day 1 that was fully accessible to them. They had the same advantages as hearing children. Deaf of Deaf are often leaders in the deaf community, not only because of their heritage, but because of their abilities to express themselves well. 70% of hearing parents with deaf kids don't sign, and many who do don't sign well, so you can imagine what happens to deaf kids when they go that first critical 5 years with limited, if any, language.
Even deaf children who have had SEE from day 1, (which almost never happens but I have met one) don't read and write as well as deaf CODA's, (Child of deaf adults, a CODA is someone who has deaf parents, usually it is used to refer to hearing people with deaf parents) because SEE is a code put on the hands, and English is not naturally a visual language, and the grammar cannot always just be "figured out" by a deaf person. I mean, a deaf person can't usually tell if something "sounds right" in English, by it "looking right" in SEE.
Speech therapy and oral skills are truly great to have, the more languages a person can speak, in whatever form, the better.
I know you will be a GREAT parent, no matter what language or combinations of languages you use, because you care about your daughter so much. Good luck with everything!

 

[loml]

My daughter was born the day after 9?11, the hosptital was on the Canadian border, the staff was more than 50% Canadian, and the borders were closed, they neglected to do the newborn hearing screen, so our daughter's deafness was not officially diagnosed until she was 18 months old.

By then, it was imparitive that we start pouring language in asap. At first, we were told to use cued speech because she has auditory neuropathy, but there were no instructors in our area

.

The National Cued Speech Association certifies beginning Cued Speech instructors to ensure consistent introductory training across the country. Certified Instructors of Cued Speech are proficient in Cued Speech production and are qualified to present information about Cued Speech and to teach beginning level Cued Speech courses.

Hester I am not aware of your location. NCSA is a very accomodating not for profit organization. In Canada the instructor will travel to a convenient location. Here is a list of instructors:

http://www.cuedspeech.org/sub/resources/findinstructor.asp

A popular misconception with CS, is that a person will need continuous help once they have learned the basics of CS. This could not be further from the truth, as CS is simply put, visual phonetics. The sound the child sees will only change if they person has a different "accent". You cue what you hear, the child sees what you say.

It all comes down to insentive to practise.

 

[Boult]

I'm confused about language education in the U.S. My month-old daughter is profoundly deaf, the 1st in my or my wife's families. I've gotten no clear answers as to the 'right', 'best', or even 'most common' route for teaching her to communicate with the deaf and hearing communities.

As I see/understand it:

(1) She should learn to communicate with hearing people via lip reading, and if possible amplification of what little hearing she may have. (Note: I'm not posting this to start a discussion on cochlear implants.) Hopefully she'll be able to speak clearly enough to be understood, but we'll see.

(2) She should learn ASL right away. No delay, start today.

(3) She should be able to translate spoken English using CASE.

It seems to me that she should learn both languages together. Is this common? Is it typically one or the other, or that ASL is delayed until later? Let me know what people recommend, and why.

Oh, and thanks!!!!!!!

RoyalGuard,

I suggest you to visit Listen-Up Site to get yourself more informed on all options of communications and many others to prepare for your child's journey in world of deafness.
start with this url: http://listen-up.org/basics.htm
check out the "What are my options?" and "Tips for Parents"

And there's more stuffs out at that website by going to main index page at: http://listen-up.org/

Hope that helps and good luck!

 

[deafdyke]

Listen-up is OK, but it's very biased towards oral-only or auditory-verbal....just a warning.

 

[deafdyke]

Despite what Listen-up insistutes, there's ABSOLUTLY NO reason why a dhh kid cannot learn both speech and sign simultanously. Yeah, I know that one of the biggest reasons why hearing parents choose oral education is b/c they are not fluent in ASL.....and that's a legitimate concern....but if hearing parents demand that their dhh kid needs to learn to speak, then hearing parents should meet the dhh kid halfway and learn how to sign too!

 

[PrincessTabu]

Listen-up is OK, but it's very biased towards oral-only or auditory-verbal....just a warning.

I used to think that too deafdyke, but the tone of the list has changed. There's more people using sign now, and it seems more balanced. What's good about Listen-Up is that it's for parents only. It's a safer environment, especially for new parents who are hesitant to say everything they're thinking or feeling. You probably wouldn't guess it, but people can be pretty hard on us :-o

Personally, I like parentdeaf-hh thru the ASDC website www.deafchildren.org
because I think it's more geared towards people not only using sign, but also people who have been around the block a few times. But anybody can join parentdeaf-hh, so there are all sorts of people involved in deaf education on there. I would suggest both groups to a new parent.

 

[deafdyke]

I used to think that too deafdyke, but the tone of the list has changed. There's more people using sign now, and it seems more balanced. What's good about Listen-Up is that it's for parents only. It's a safer environment, especially for new parents who are hesitant to say everything they're thinking or feeling. You probably wouldn't guess it, but people can be pretty hard on us

Personally, I like parentdeaf-hh thru the ASDC website www.deafchildren.org

Not the Listen-Up list....the site. It's all about how wonderful the oral option is....and just has token stuff about Sign and Deaf Culture on it.
VOMIT!!!! The founder of the site is VERY VERY audist...I mean she's slowly accepting ASL, but she still....I dunno....kinda sees it as more of a jr high school girl hobby thing......I like parent deaf-hh very unbiased as to methodology......it's a lot more like this site.

 

[rjr2006]

they can use PSE

 

[AestasCaelum]

Hi,
There is no evidence that using signs detracts in any way from developing speech, actually in my child's case I think it helped develop speech.

Yes, but there IS evidance supporting that signing with your baby does increase their IQ and that when they do start talking (if they do) it will be quicker and they'll be able to put together more complete sentences faster than those children who arent started with sign. ALSO, because the child is now able to communicate what they want it cuts down on tempertantrums.

But damned if I can find that news article now ..I'll keep looking, and post it when I do.

 

[Interpretrator]

if the child uses ASL DIRECTLY instead of learning ESL then he/she will have poor English skills.

That is ridiculous.

That is a huge generalization and perhaps applies to you or other people you know but it is CERTAINLY not true in all cases. I know many Deaf people who had ASL as their first language and are now perfectly proficient in written English (and spoken, depending on the person; some prefer not to speak).

There is no one right solution for everyone and there is absolutely no point in scaring a parent by telling them their child can't learn English if they learn ASL.

Read some of the works of leading figures in the Deaf community such as Ben Bahan, Sam and Ted Supalla, and then tell me whether they couldn't learn English.

 

[RoyalGuard]

Wow. OK, that's a lot of info....THANKS THANKS THANKS!

Here's a few things I'm darn sure of:

(1) Learning ASL right away has got to be a good idea.

(2) It's NOT a one-way-versus-another thing. The more languages/methods we learn, the better! (Thanks Reba, for noting that it's the whole family who are learning)

(3) The "deaf community" is really cool.

-RoyalGuard

 

[deafdyke]

It's NOT a one-way-versus-another thing. The more languages/methods we learn, the better! (Thanks Reba, for noting that it's the whole family who are learning)

(3) The "deaf community" is really cool.

AMEN!!!!!
I just wish some of those idoit "I'm better then manualists" folks had been exposed to MANY different methodolgies....To the parents in this thread: I applaud you for exposing your child to ALL the methodologies possible!