Reception problems with finger spelling (dyslexia)

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Medic18

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I’m 32 years of age and I am a fully hearing student of ASL 2. I understand that finger spelling is apart of the ASL culture and it is a skill that I must master. I am able to finger spell without a problem, but my reception of finger spelling is very bad. No, it is not because I am a lazy student or I am not putting in my time, it is because I was born with dyslexia. I am able to see each letter as it is signed, but putting the letters together to forum a word is very hard. I have spent hours on asl.ms to work on my skills, but I am still having a hard time with it.

I need to see the whole word to make out what it is. That is how I was brought up, sound out each letter. But to sound the word out in my head without seeing it is a problem for me.

If you are a hearing student with dyslexia, do you have any ideas or ways to improve your finger spelling reception? Or, any other ideas to help with ASL overall with having dyslexia?
 
The only thing I can think/suggest, is when you're receptively trying to read a word, don't look at individual letters. Sound the word out in your head as it goes. Reading finger spelling is tricky for most people in the beginning, even without dyslexia. I would suggest continued practice, even outside of class. There are websites that have finger spelling quizzes you can take.

Good luck!
 
Thanks for asking this question Medic. I was too afraid to do so myself. And thanks for the advice CSign. I'm sure I can speak on behalf of Medic when I say thank you for your help!

I have a hard time with "fingerspelling" and "numbers". Even worse at my job I deal with colors all day. I can not distinguish "green" from "red". And yes, I know I'm somewhat colorblind but I've learned to deal with it over the years. I just ask people which color the object is and which pile it belongs to.
 
Wirelessly posted

I am also dyslexic. I find that practicing fingerspelling yourself helps. There will come a time when you switch from looking at each and every letter, to the the movements of the hand via your general field vision. At this stage you are mostly keeping eye contact with your friend. Most experienced signers will have guessed the word well before you finished signing it.
 
Trying to catch the entire word and not individual letters is important. Also, keep in mind, that whomever is spelling to you isn't necessarily even spelling the word correctly. In that case, focusing on the letters will just make it harder to figure out. You might get the letters right but still not get the word.

If it's something really important to get 100% correct like an email address or phone number, have the other person write it down.

Also, you can mirror their spelling. That is, as the other person spells to you, spell back to them at the same time. By feeling those letters rather than just seeing them it might help you decipher them.
 
Medic18 said:
I’m 32 years of age and I am a fully hearing student of ASL 2. I understand that finger spelling is apart of the ASL culture and it is a skill that I must master. I am able to finger spell without a problem, but my reception of finger spelling is very bad. No, it is not because I am a lazy student or I am not putting in my time, it is because I was born with dyslexia. I am able to see each letter as it is signed, but putting the letters together to forum a word is very hard. I have spent hours on asl.ms to work on my skills, but I am still having a hard time with it.

I need to see the whole word to make out what it is. That is how I was brought up, sound out each letter. But to sound the word out in my head without seeing it is a problem for me.

If you are a hearing student with dyslexia, do you have any ideas or ways to improve your finger spelling reception? Or, any other ideas to help with ASL overall with having dyslexia?
Click to expand...

This is one of the reasons I was never able to learn ASL. I told my teachers that I really couldn't spell, but they always laughed, assuming that I was joking - which I wasn't. You can finger spell all day with me but I need to see the word in order to get it. The only thing I can suggest is try fingerspelling as much as you can stand it.

Laura
 
Lau2046 said:
This is one of the reasons I was never able to learn ASL. I told my teachers that I really couldn't spell, but they always laughed, assuming that I was joking - which I wasn't. You can finger spell all day with me but I need to see the word in order to get it. The only thing I can suggest is try fingerspelling as much as you can stand it.

Laura
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What about the rest of ASL, without spelling? Could you learn that?
 
Another dyslexic here (thank heavens for spell check!)

When learning (and reading) fingerspelling, I find that seeing the overall shape of the word as well as letter groups is helpful instead of seeing individual letters or even trying to get the entire word (unless it's short like "THE").

For example if I'm fingerspelling BATTERY (which is almost always spelled here) I'll read it as "Ba TT eRY". I also look for the distinctive shape that the fingerspelled word BATTERY makes on the hand.

Another example CHARACTER , I'll read as CH ARA CTER or CHA RAC TER (depending on the style of the signer... but I also look at the letter height pattern to fill in clues.

One trick is also to memorize common 3, 4 & 5 letter combinations (sch, thr, est, ings, ght, tion, tions) so that you always will be able to read that as a single letter cluster.
 
Reba said:
What about the rest of ASL, without spelling? Could you learn that?
Click to expand...

I probably could, yes. The grammar was a challenage, but not impossible like finger spelling. I had always wanted to learn ASL but I thought if you couldn't spell, it was pointless.

Laura
 
Anij said:
Another dyslexic here (thank heavens for spell check!)

When learning (and reading) fingerspelling, I find that seeing the overall shape of the word as well as letter groups is helpful instead of seeing individual letters or even trying to get the entire word (unless it's short like "THE").

For example if I'm fingerspelling BATTERY (which is almost always spelled here) I'll read it as "Ba TT eRY". I also look for the distinctive shape that the fingerspelled word BATTERY makes on the hand.

Another example CHARACTER , I'll read as CH ARA CTER or CHA RAC TER (depending on the style of the signer... but I also look at the letter height pattern to fill in clues.

One trick is also to memorize common 3, 4 & 5 letter combinations (sch, thr, est, ings, ght, tion, tions) so that you always will be able to read that as a single letter cluster.
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Some good tips, yes. If one thinks of the spelling more as combined handshapes that make one sign, similar to loan signs (CLUB, EASY) or combo signs (HOME-WORK).

Absolutely practice the letter groups (st, er, gh, qu), on to the 3, 4, & 5's, until they flow.
 
Lau2046 said:
That's a cool site, wish I could understand something, but it moves too fast for me - and I just set it to the slowest speed; too bad you can't just pause it. I recently discovered this site when I did a search:

http://www.aslpro.com/cgi-bin/aslpro/aslpro.cgi

Laura
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That's a good site, too.

With the fingerspelling site, maybe you can set it to just 3 letters at the slowest speed. The replay it as often as you need to. Try to read one letter at a time and write it down on paper. Then read the next letter, write it down, then the next one.

With practice you might be able to read more letters at once. Maybe even increase the speed or the number of letters.

I wonder if that might work?
 
DeafBadger said:
That's a good site, too.

With the fingerspelling site, maybe you can set it to just 3 letters at the slowest speed. The replay it as often as you need to. Try to read one letter at a time and write it down on paper. Then read the next letter, write it down, then the next one.

With practice you might be able to read more letters at once. Maybe even increase the speed or the number of letters.

I wonder if that might work?
Click to expand...

Can't hurt to try....thanks.

Laura
 
Lau2046 said:
I probably could, yes. The grammar was a challenage, but not impossible like finger spelling. I had always wanted to learn ASL but I thought if you couldn't spell, it was pointless.

Laura
Click to expand...
It's a little harder without spelling but not impossible.

Think about it. Children know how to sign before they know how to spell. (When pre-reading kids finger "spell" their first words they aren't really spelling but making signs that just happen to use the alphabet.)

Also, I know people who are illiterate as far as reading, writing, or spelling English, and they sign ASL. When they do "spell" something it because they memorize a name as a series of shapes, not letters. (One example was a young man I knew who came from another country where he was never taught to sign in his own language, and had never attended school; he learned ASL in the USA as an adult.) He literally had to sign his name with an X.

Then, there are people who physically can't fingerspell. I believe Dr. Vicars daughter is one of them because she's lacking joints in her fingers. There are also people with arthritis, amputations, and other medical conditions that cause them to not be able to fingerspell. Yet, they communicate with ASL.

Finally, there are some people who just plain can't spell, and life goes on.

If you worry that you won't be able to communicate your name and text number to new acquaintances, get some inexpensive business cards with your contact info on them and hand them out as needed. You can even get them with your picture so you'll be remembered. :)

There's almost always some kind of work around available.
 
Reba said:
It's a little harder without spelling but not impossible.

Think about it. Children know how to sign before they know how to spell. (When pre-reading kids finger "spell" their first words they aren't really spelling but making signs that just happen to use the alphabet.)

Also, I know people who are illiterate as far as reading, writing, or spelling English, and they sign ASL. When they do "spell" something it because they memorize a name as a series of shapes, not letters. (One example was a young man I knew who came from another country where he was never taught to sign in his own language, and had never attended school; he learned ASL in the USA as an adult.) He literally had to sign his name with an X.

Then, there are people who physically can't fingerspell. I believe Dr. Vicars daughter is one of them because she's lacking joints in her fingers. There are also people with arthritis, amputations, and other medical conditions that cause them to not be able to fingerspell. Yet, they communicate with ASL.

Finally, there are some people who just plain can't spell, and life goes on.

If you worry that you won't be able to communicate your name and text number to new acquaintances, get some inexpensive business cards with your contact info on them and hand them out as needed. You can even get them with your picture so you'll be remembered. :)

There's almost always some kind of work around available.
Click to expand...

Thanks Reba, I might give it a go and work on it in my spare time. It'd be nice to learn...I could clearly benefit from it.

Laura
 
Man, I step away to school and rotation at work and I miss a lot. I have must to reply to

CSign~ If my Professor was finger spelling slower, I would be able to sound the letters out instead on identifying each letter. But the man is going lighting fast. But I will be using some web sites and slow down the sign to see if I can work with that.

Tbone~ I believe that the only stupide question is an unanswered question. If I do not ask I will not learn and improve. I do not want to disrespect my professor, other deaf people at my school, and/or the deaf culture. So the best thing is to ask, if you look at all the replies to my post, they are all encouraging for all of us students to better understand there language and culture. In the future, if you have a question that you do not feel comfortable asking, just PM me and I will post it.

BesLak~ I have started seeing that when I am holding a conversation in ASL with other. But when the professor is standing in front of the class signing one word at a time, at deaf speed (no disrespect, that is my professor term that I am using) it is hard to tell if he is signing CONTRACT vs CONTACT or CONFIDENCE vs CONFIDENTIAL. That is where I am starting to get jammed up

Reba ~ I really like you idea about the mirror, never thought of that. If I know the word that I am finger spelling and I see it at the same time might help me. Never hurts to try and sound like a very good idea. I will be doing that for the next few days. Thank you very much.

Lau2046 (Laura) ~ I have special services telling my professor that I am truly dyslexic and have been diagnosed with it by a doctor. Don’t give up on this beautiful language just because of the finger spelling. Just signing on word at random, yes it is very hard. But in the middle of a conversation you will pick up on the word that they are about to finger spell even before they are halfway done. Never give up; I know that I am not!

Anij ~ I never thought about breaking it down to 3 to 5 combinations of letters. That along with Reba idea about the mirror are two of the best ideas that I will be using for a couple of days.

DeafBadger ~ Dr. Vicars’ website is my go to site. The only thing is if I see word like blue, I will see each letter B-L-U-E, and I will even say them out like over and over again. It is not until I type if out on the screen does it hit me what the word is. I am trying to overcome that, but I am working hard on it.
 
Thank you so much everyone, you all have some great ideas. Please keep the ideas coming, I know that I am not the only one with dyslexia and/or have a problem with finger spelling.

So if you have any other tips or tricks with finger spelling and/or ASL signs overall, I would like to hear about them. It never hurts to try something different to improve my skills.

I am studying to be a trauma nurse and a sign language interpreter. In the event I get a deaf person in my trauma bay, I want to do everything that I can to respect the culture and help that person out.
 
Practice list:
 

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If you can get a copy of this book, it has a lot of practice drills and tips in it:

Expressive and Receptive Fingerspelling for Hearing Adults by LaVera M. Guillory.

It's a very old book. When I first learned how to fingerspell (dactylology) our instructor made us practice Rochester style--every word was spelled!
 
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