I hate this........

Beach girl said:
I try. I can Google with the best of 'em. :lol:

Glenn, the "you" was to Jillio. I didn't purposely delete the name, it just didn't magically appear when I cut and pasted the quote from her post.



Ok, well, then, find and refute (um, not "rebuke") then. I'm really interested. I was an English teacher years ago, teaching college-level writing to budding electrical engineers, and I swear, that was like teaching English as a Second Language. Some of those guys really struggled with spelling and writing generally. I thought at that time that the issue was that those guys thought very visually, not verbally, and thus had problems.

I would imagine that for deaf children who did not have exposure to listening to language, learning to write would also be like dealing with a foreign language. I'd love to see the research that shows how they acquire good spelling and other language skills.
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All I have to do is ask you a question. That question would be do you really believe that the average hearing person is actually at 12th grade English?
 
When it comes to questions like that, I try not to "believe" anything. I like to see what the research says.

And...the research these days says that the average literacy rate is actually declining.

Literacy of College Graduates Is on Decline - washingtonpost.com

""It's appalling -- it's really astounding," said Michael Gorman, president of the American Library Association and a librarian at California State University at Fresno. "Only 31 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it. That's not saying much for the remainder." "

I do believe that a lot of kids are graduating from high school with poor reading and writing skills (unlike in MY day, of course, when we were all perfect....). Seriously, I think it's a big problem, nationally.

Now if you're going to tell me that deaf kids are no worse, ok, show me the research that has found that to be true. I'd love for that to be true. But I don't "believe" anything until I see some documentation of the facts.
 
posts from hell said:
All I have to do is ask you a question. That question would be do you really believe that the average hearing person is actually at 12th grade English?
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That really depends on what equation you're using to determine "average" and "12 grade," but by most measures, it would be true. It's also true that a large amount of hearing people have literacy levels well below 12 grade--plenty, in fact, that are functionally illiterate.

Nevertheless, I disagree with Beach Girl about the spelling thing. I have seen enough evidence showing that deaf children are better spellers (but poorer with grammar). But there's no denying the fact that, on the whole, the average deaf literacy levels are lower than the average hearing. The reasons for this have nothing to do with deafness.
 
Beach girl said:
When it comes to questions like that, I try not to "believe" anything. I like to see what the research says.

And...the research these days says that the average literacy rate is actually declining.

Literacy of College Graduates Is on Decline - washingtonpost.com

""It's appalling -- it's really astounding," said Michael Gorman, president of the American Library Association and a librarian at California State University at Fresno. "Only 31 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it. That's not saying much for the remainder." "

I do believe that a lot of kids are graduating from high school with poor reading and writing skills (unlike in MY day, of course, when we were all perfect....). Seriously, I think it's a big problem, nationally.

Now if you're going to tell me that deaf kids are no worse, ok, show me the research that has found that to be true. I'd love for that to be true. But I don't "believe" anything until I see some documentation of the facts.
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The point I was making - if you're going to show some research, please be sure of it. Be sure you believe in it before you just toss it around.
It's pretty certain that the average isn't 12th grade as you cited.
 
Beach girl said:
When it comes to questions like that, I try not to "believe" anything. I like to see what the research says.

And...the research these days says that the average literacy rate is actually declining.

Literacy of College Graduates Is on Decline - washingtonpost.com

""It's appalling -- it's really astounding," said Michael Gorman, president of the American Library Association and a librarian at California State University at Fresno. "Only 31 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it. That's not saying much for the remainder." "

I do believe that a lot of kids are graduating from high school with poor reading and writing skills (unlike in MY day, of course, when we were all perfect....). Seriously, I think it's a big problem, nationally.

Now if you're going to tell me that deaf kids are no worse, ok, show me the research that has found that to be true. I'd love for that to be true. But I don't "believe" anything until I see some documentation of the facts.
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This is not true. Again, it all depends on methodology and statistics. One thing you need to keep in mind is that reading and writing is not a static skill that one either has or doesn't have. Writing and reading is a practice. It is something that one must continually work at to become more proficient in. I saw freshmen come into my class at the beginning of the semester with "literacy" levels that I would have ranked below average, but they left my class with proficient levels. It had very little to do with me as a teacher and more to to with their earnestness and work ethic.

It could very well be true that the bar for "proficiency" is rising as our discourse communities continually expand and diversify. Literacy levels in the past were higher simply because language was not as complex and the sheer amount of literature, idioms, and symbolism involved was much less.

Chew on that.
 
TheWriteAlex said:
That really depends on what equation you're using to determine "average" and "12 grade," but by most measures, it would be true. It's also true that a large amount of hearing people have literacy levels well below 12 grade--plenty, in fact, that are functionally illiterate.

Nevertheless, I disagree with Beach Girl about the spelling thing. I have seen enough evidence showing that deaf children are better spellers (but poorer with grammar). But there's no denying the fact that, on the whole, the average deaf literacy levels are lower than the average hearing. The reasons for this have nothing to do with deafness.
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Yeah, I just dislike it when people skew stats for their benefit. That's exactly the reason for me not bringing in any research in this thread. I used average and "12th grade" because she used that in her research pull. It said something along the lines of the Deaf being 4th grade and 8 grades behind.

Again for everyone, the issue I have in this is oppression. Just because of the communication barrier because people just don't know any better. Not because of English itself. It's the whole picture.
 
PFH, is your point that the average for everyone is lower, and that deaf kids can spell (and read and write) at the same, presumably low, level? Looks like TheWriteAlex would disagree with you on that.

If you want to prove your point though, show me the research that indicates that deaf kids are at the same level as hearing. I haven't seen it; everything I've seen indicates what Alex said, that deaf kids' level of reading and writing is lower than that of hearing kids.
 
Beach girl said:
PFH, is your point that the average for everyone is lower, and that deaf kids can spell (and read and write) at the same, presumably low, level? Looks like TheWriteAlex would disagree with you on that.

If you want to prove your point though, show me the research that indicates that deaf kids are at the same level as hearing. I haven't seen it; everything I've seen indicates what Alex said, that deaf kids' level of reading and writing is lower than that of hearing kids.
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Can you show me where I said that?

I would like to tell you to read this entire thread again, and read my reasons for posting this thread several times over then participate in the discussion after you fully understand.
 
Beach girl said:
PFH, is your point that the average for everyone is lower, and that deaf kids can spell (and read and write) at the same, presumably low, level? Looks like TheWriteAlex would disagree with you on that.

If you want to prove your point though, show me the research that indicates that deaf kids are at the same level as hearing. I haven't seen it; everything I've seen indicates what Alex said, that deaf kids' level of reading and writing is lower than that of hearing kids.
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Keep in mind that I said the reasons for this have NOTHING to do with them being deaf.
 
You (PFH) claimed: "Even I can easily find research to rebuke that," but you so far have not shown any research refuting that.

Then you asked "do you really believe that the average hearing person is actually at 12th grade English?"

Regardless of my "belief," my question is whether deaf kids spell (and read and write) at the same level as hearing kids. If the "average" is indeed lower than what used to be considered a 12th grade level, then ok, take that lower level. Are deaf and hearing kids equal at whatever level is indeed average when they graduate from h.s.?

I honestly do not know. From what research I've seen, deaf kids do not do as well. But prove me wrong. Not just with your opinion or your hatred of oppression; show me the research that proves otherwise. I have a very open mind on the subject.
 
Beach girl said:
You (PFH) claimed: "Even I can easily find research to rebuke that," but you so far have not shown any research refuting that.

Then you asked "do you really believe that the average hearing person is actually at 12th grade English?"

Regardless of my "belief," my question is whether deaf kids spell (and read and write) at the same level as hearing kids. If the "average" is indeed lower than what used to be considered a 12th grade level, then ok, take that lower level. Are deaf and hearing kids equal at whatever level is indeed average when they graduate from h.s.?

I honestly do not know. From what research I've seen, deaf kids do not do as well. But prove me wrong. Not just with your opinion or your hatred of oppression; show me the research that proves otherwise. I have a very open mind on the subject.
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Ok this is diverting from the point of interest here. You can go and create another thread about this. I'm not interested in discussing literacy rates in this thread.
 
some people may not able to write in english cuz they had been used to foreign langaugae like spainsh or greece and so on.. it can be a common that some people can't even write right english.. so that doesn't bother me but I usually make gesture if they can't understand me :roll:
 
jillio said:
Actuallly, the deaf are better spellers than the hearing. So much for your vast knowledge.
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yeah I know one who is US marshall who have trouble spelling. I constantly correct this person's spelling. This person relys on the check spelling too excessive. :lol:
 
It's an interesting topic, and I even wonder if the language of reference does make any difference...?
I don't know about researches, I only know it's really not easy to verify is a research is done like it shold and not, let us say, "manipulated" for some reason so... I trust researches and statistic only until a certain point.

What I noticed, with only one year of dealing with deafness, many deaf children and adults make writing errors. Which can depend on so many factors, actually... There are issues that can be the same as many hearing children: language delays, for example...
What I noticed is that many deaf people make the same mistakes when it comes to written italian, and what's more interesting, is they do regardless of what kind of education they received: oral deafs does same mistakes as signing deafs, children wuth CI make the same mistakes as children with HAs and so on. I think this can be related with a more visual-oriented mind, and also don't think this is necessarily bad in itself (to have a visual-oriented mind I mean).

One more issue can be (but this may only be my wrong impression) that deaf children are sooooo much forced into talking/listening/reading that some of them come to HATE it. And this is such a pity, because as someone said, if you quit practicing of course your level will fall down - in any language. I know sone deaf people that simply NEVER reads a book or newspaper. And for hearing or deaf people, the best way to learn to read and write well is to read a lot and with pleasure.

What I mean is: we all think that deaf children CAN absolutely do as good as CAN hearing ones, so if they (sometime?) don't, there may be something wrong in the way they are taught to. The same with hearing children, actually.

I hope that this doesn't sound rude in any way (I also have issues in english you know)!
 
Spellcheck is my husband's best friend. He's brilliant, well-educated, and well-read, but still can't spell to save his life. One of his degrees is in medieval and renaissance literature, and I'm convinced that he uses old or middle English spelling at times, unintentionally.

It's unfortunate, because how you spell REALLY makes such a difference in how people perceive your intelligence. He could easily have made the same horrible mistakes seen in the OP and his perspective would have been 'you know what I meant, right?' And, 'don't they have spellcheck at the paper or editors for that sort of thing'? Anyway, it's not likely that someone very senior places the employment ads for a company, probably an intern accustomed to texting. Kids today! :)

So many conflicting studies on this, and so many variables, but this article addresses a question of whether or not Deaf kid's spelling deficits vs. hearing kids found (these are predominantly ASL-using deaf, specifically) are tied to issues of phonological sensitivity.

This later article, on the other hand, found that while a significant gap in literacy/reading ability exists between hearing and deaf kids studied, there's no difference in ability to spell.
 
Banjo said:
Well, I have met plenty of Americans and Canadians who I would consider to be functionally illiterate.
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Same here.
I'll never forget the time i decided to write my order at a McDonalds many years ago.
The guy at drive in window couldn't read my writing so he called in the manager to read it. He couldn't read it either so he called in another co-worker who couldn't read it either. I had to draw pictures of how I wanted my hamburger done and I had to indicate in sign laungage if i wanted my fries large or small.
>.<

They all were born and raised in the USA. We're not talking about foreigners.
 
deafskeptic said:
Same here.
I'll never forget the time i decided to write my order at a McDonalds many years ago.
The guy at drive in window couldn't read my writing so he called in the manager to read it. He couldn't read it either so he called in another co-worker who couldn't read it either. I had to draw pictures of how I wanted my hamburger done and I had to indicate in sign laungage if i wanted my fries large or small.
>.<

They all were born and raised in the USA. We're not talking about foreigners.
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I always print my words so it's easy to read.
 
rockin'robin said:
I've met many hearies who could not read or write....and some, when they did write, it was all "scrawled" and unnreadable....I've had hearies also ask me "how do you spell?".....(such a word)...when we play Scrabble....

And the very most irritable thing a hearie can say to me is..."I ain't got none"!

And the "shocked" look whenever they give you a form to read, even write something, and you glance at it...(read it very fast)...and they say..."Huh? Did you read it"?..."Boy, you're a fast reader!"...As if that's the most amazing thing they've ever seen!
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Double negatives are a pet peeve of mine.

When I read forms or books in front of my Dad, he thinks it's impossible for anyone to read as fast as I can so I often have to read forms several times over before he believes I'm actually reading it.
 
I know it's off topic and PFH doesn't want to talk about this, but there is one question that I haven't seen brought up.

If we improve the literacy rates of hearing kids to their respective grades, will deaf people follow suit?
 
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