Hello,
I enjoyed reading many blogs and vlogs in Deafread.
I did not learn sign language til later as teenager and wished that I learned earlier.
I read that many of you have same experience as I did. I think it is time that we do something about sign language to children, the children of the eye.
I have learned so much from some of you about why, what happened, who did all this to us? Even my parents told me about the school explaining that sign language was not a good idea.
Now I will join to speak up and would like to know more about how we can stop the deprivation of education and language for deaf children in school. There are many, many sad stories about many deaf people went through during school years.
Blue Eyes
19 responses so far ↓
Peachlady // January 11, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Welcome to Deafread! I learned sign language when I was 13 years old,too.
Look forward to read your blogs!
Paula Rosenthal // January 11, 2008 at 6:14 pm
“Stop the deprivation of education and language for deaf children in school?” Your childhood and that of other deaf students in your generation is vastly different than the deaf children growing up now. Today, there are thousands of children who are deaf and hard of hearing who have or are successfully learning oral language in great part to earlier diagnosis of hearing loss, digital hearing aid technology and advancements in the quality of sound and speech delivered by cochlear implants.
If parents decide to teach their children ASL then that’s their choice, as it should be. After all, parents don’t have children so other people can tell them how they should be raised. Haven’t doctors been doing that for decades, telling families to send their children with disabilities away to hospitals, special homes and schools? How well did that turn out?
Deb Ann // January 11, 2008 at 8:29 pm
Hello!
Welcome to Deafread! I am so excited to read more of your upcoming blogs!
asldeaf // January 11, 2008 at 9:23 pm
Paula,
I love my parents and they made a choice and work very hard.
I had good childhood life with my oral friends. But as I grew up, social life changes, I was no longer a playing child. My socialization depended on how I talk and listen. I love to listen to music but not really understand vocal words that people sings.
My parents made the choice for me to speak oral, fine, but where is my choice when I grew up? I need to socialize like my hearing friends but I was limited.
I will talk more later about learning sign language and made me a whole person.
Blue Eyes
anna s // January 11, 2008 at 9:28 pm
I am an avid reader of some blogs on DeafRead. I want to say welcome!!
Yeah, I feel for you for having to experience growing up without a visual language. Frankly, i know so many who felt deprived emotionally even though their language, speech ability seem to be at par with the hearing. But please read Paula Rosenthal’s comment above, she is somewhat correct. The current generation is vastly different from our previous generations. However, there are still some deaf children ending up in special day class at DHH programs with cochlear implants or state of art hearing technology with significant language delays. I work in the mainstreamed schools and have seen that happening nowadays. They are stil la small percentage of deaf children who needs to be in a specially designated instrcutional setting (aka ASL or SEe used in the classroom for the full day). Heck, I do see some of them in SDC for one or two periods of the day for tutorial assistance through sign language and are mainstreamed for the rest of the day. Some attend for one period just for social emotional needs, to be with deaf signing peers. To sum it up, it is best to have all options available as every deaf child is different.
Again, welcome!
LaRonda // January 11, 2008 at 9:52 pm
We are with you, friend, as you go through your own journey of self-exploration and Deafhood.
Welcome.
~ LaRonda
ChrisH // January 11, 2008 at 10:59 pm
Ann s, you are a very stranger where you were coming from. You have nothing to respect child’s choice and Deaf adult suffering from oral oppression.
Why your son has a cochlear implants?
Paula
“ Today, there are thousands of children who are deaf and hard of hearing who have or are successfully learning oral language in great part to earlier diagnosis of hearing loss, digital hearing aid technology and advancements in the quality of sound and speech delivered by cochlear implants.”
It is sad for Deaf children have experienced the feeling of oppression.
drmzz // January 11, 2008 at 11:04 pm
Hello and welcome! I like the titles. Already Paula went off the deep end to blog about this post. “Signing crusaders” she said? Umm, where? ASL signing population is still a *minority* in schools and life and typically we have to contend with the likes of her and others who assume what is best for Deaf children. I debunk their science. I consider them the ignorant and selfish majority. It is incredible that schools give parents misinformation of ASL. STILL TO THIS DAY! Play fair please.
Julie Rems-Smario // January 11, 2008 at 11:12 pm
Welcome! I strong identify with you because of our backgrounds. You will meet many wonderful people via this blogsphere. I look forward to your stories.
Julie
Jeffrey // January 12, 2008 at 12:09 am
Bienvenidos! Hop onto the bangwagon of the new revolution. I’m pleased to see another blogger who wants the best for all deaf children:
ASL
As for Paula,
Hoo Ideals vs. Deaf Experience?
getouttahere!
Ojos Azules,.. Welcome Aboard!
Patty K. // January 12, 2008 at 12:11 am
Blue Eyes,
I suggest you to read the book, Talking Hands: What Sign Language Reveals About the Mind.
http://www.simonsays.com/content/destination.cfm?tab=22&pid=367393
You will understand about yourself better.
Patty K.
Rini // January 12, 2008 at 2:50 am
Whether or not that these days are vastly different than when I was growing up with CI, I still believe that ASL needs to be a part of a deaf person’s life. Even if it’s bilingual (and boost IQ points while they’re at it). I can speak very well, I can listen pretty well. I didn’t have any resources or accommodations in my last two years of high school and first two years of college. But recently, I have come to be fed up with not being able to participate with other students class discussion and generally feeling like a classroom ghost so I’ve begun fighting for what I actually need.
It doesn’t matter if deaf and hoh kids are growing up mainstreamed, I went to a mainstream high school and left oral program because it no longer served me. The only thing that left me in the dark was social life–it was nonexistent when I moved halfway through my high school because of the environment. I despised it, and left me in the dark ’til now.
So, welcome to the blogosphere! 8D
Blue Eyes // January 12, 2008 at 3:34 am
Peachlady, Deb Ann, Julie
Thank you for welcoming me into blogsphere.
Paula,
“Haven’t doctors been doing that for decades, telling families to send their children with disabilities away to hospitals, special homes and schools? How well did that turn out?”
Sadly, I still don’t think doctors understand about deafness. Now they are telling families to send their deaf children to specialist that only care about making money. Sign language don’t generate money for those specialist. Sign language is last on the list (if it is even on the list) to discuss about.
We need to find a way to work together. Sign language is not evil.
Ann S
I think CI can work out for some deaf children but seems that ASL can work out for many deaf children too. Why not do both the same time?
Some deaf people are leery about CI but nearly all oral schools are against sign language and people tell deaf people to respect oral schools’ wishes to be against sign language but tell deaf people that it is wrong to be against CI. This really puzzles me.
LaRonda,
Yes, I need to buy Deafhood book as I have so much to learn.
Drmzz,
Yes, how true that oral schools and organizations such as Alexander Graham Bell do not tell everything about language for the deaf. I would like to do something about this but people say, leave them alone and respect their wish. Ugh!
Jeffery,
Thank you for welcoming me.
I understand how you feel about this. Everyone needs to learn about what deaf children needs to do best in school. We need to educate them rather than tell them to leave.
Remember, I said that I understand your feelings and fully support you.
Patty,
Thank you for the information about the book. I just got back from the bookstore and got it. I hope this is a good book and will recommend it if I find it very good.
Rini,
Both of us have same experience as many, many others too.
I hope this new organization, DBC, will help many future deaf babies and children be fulfilled with education and language. I want to be a member of DBC and was told that new website will soon come out and will join membership.
Blue Eyes
Beth // January 12, 2008 at 8:02 am
Hi and welcome! I love what I *think* is your ultimate your objective: to promote ASL. But I feel a little bit uncomfortable about your method, but only because of the language in the last paragraph. So maybe that’s why you are receiving some push back from people — there’s easily a bit of misinterpretation there if you frame it that way.
I too believe that all children, not just deaf children, could benefit greatly by learning ASL, and I think that it’s often (not always) the most effective language for deaf children, whether they have CIs or not. But I consider that just my own opinion based on my daughter, research, my own family, where I live and what i have access to, and my situation. I think that Paula (and many others who have gone oral) knows far better than I (or any of us out there) what’s best for her family and child.
I believe that whatever language(s) families decide to use at home and/or teach is a matter of personal choice and geography/access. Look at it this way: you wouldn’t want a group of hearing people setting up a coalition with the exact same stated goal of “stopping the deprivation of language and education for deaf children” and telling you that you should get cochlear implants for your child because that’s what they believe is the best method of communication. I would be horrified by that approach, and I’m sure you would be. Wouldn’t it make you angry as a parent to have someone tell you what to do with your child?
Another way of going about this that would win people over to your way of thinking could be to promote the positives, the benefits of ASL — not just in words, but with examples and role model behavior. I read deafread everyday, because I am trying to immerse myself in ASL and deaf culture and learn as much as possible. There are so many brilliant vlogs and blogs, even if they have opinions that differ from mine, I learn so much from them. But I couldn’t read them if they attacked me and my way viciously every time I logged on, and I’d lose a very valuable perspective if I stopped reading.
Going on the offensive and implicitly or explicitly accusing those who don’t use ASL as doing harm to their children (no parent takes that lightly or comfortably) just closes minds and alienates people who don’t feel that you have a right to say how their children are raised.
I know hearing parents of deaf children who simply don’t know much about ASL because they don’t live near any deaf schools, don’t have any deaf friends or know any deaf people in their area. And many who do know ASL, and would like to learn it, have no real access to it on a regular basis, so for them, it’s like teaching their child a foreign language they themselves don’t know and which is never used in conversation and isn’t practical. But with the internet and your blog, you can be visible and you have the power to reach those people, rather than to alienate them.
And there’s another way you can reach people and avoid fighting with parents over their children or with schools that are formed around a different philosophy of learning: start your campaigning on the State level, by making sure new parents receive a balanced education when they have a deaf child. As a hearing parent of a deaf child (one whose primary language is now ASL), my first step when I found that she was deaf was to go online and contact the Massachusetts Commission for the Deaf and HOH. They have such a great program to educate parents and immediately set me up with weekly ASL classes for my whole family (and any neighbors or friends!) in my home, on weekends (!) and the most amazing advocate, Rosa Lee Gallimore [ http://www.rosaleeshow.com/about-rosa-lee/ ] who explained the basics of Deaf culture and language options and took us to visit deaf and mainstream organizations and schools. She remained objective and would not push any direction, but we were so impressed with her that she shaped our earliest perceptions of what deafness is and isn’t and we opted for ASL and a school for the deaf. She is an excellent role model for our daughter, and by being those role models, you who have strong opinions about how it should be done can shape the way hearing parents think and educate their children long before they get to a particular type of school or decide on a philosophy for language or a medical path.
You said it beautifully in a later comment “We need to educate them rather than tell them to leave”, so I think it’s just that one line in the into and the issue of ‘deprivation’ that has caused problems: Telling parents they are depriving their children makes them run for the hills or fight back and not see the good in what you are trying to do. You can be much more powerful if you tell and show them why ASL is wonderful, not why they are evil.
And remember, it’s a beautiful, complex and intimidating second language for hearing families to learn very quickly so they can use it to teach their little ones. You would laugh at how many times I played drmzz’s music vlogs again and again (and in slow motion) so I could “sing” in ASL to my daughter at night. Learning poetry in ASL is kicking my butt, but my goal is to be ‘reciting’ Shakespeare in ASL to her by the 2nd grade. And I don’t think I’d know enough to be doing any of this if my state hadn’t given me a balanced set of options and a great Deaf advocate.
brenster- // January 12, 2008 at 8:38 am
Blue Eyes- I totally agree with you when you said: “people tell deaf people to respect oral schools’ wishes to be against sign language but tell deaf people that it is wrong to be against CI. This really puzzles me.”
This is the same point I always mentioned. For example, people accuse Deaf community for excluding some people (which is not true), but AGBell practices exclusion of signing Deafies. The people said that’s AGBell’s right! Duh!
I look forward to reading your future posts.
asldeaf // January 12, 2008 at 9:03 am
Beth
Should we have a retreat where we can be together and learn something. I have so much to learn and so do they too.
Can you contact AGBell/AVT if they will be willing to sit down with real Deaf people with the media and see what we can come up with what is best?
Please let me know.
Blue eye
td // January 13, 2008 at 3:24 am
Do Deaf parents of hearing children learn to use spoken language because that is their child’s “natural language”? It seems like nonsense, doesn’t it. I know that this is not quite the same, but when you’ve grown up using one language and method of communication, it is not easy to learn another. Wouldn’t it be great if EVERYONE learned ASL in school, then there would be no division. Anyway, choosing a communication method for my son was the single most difficult choice I’ve ever had to make. You cannot understand unless you’ve had to make a decision like that yourself – a decision that your child will have to live with forever. You have random people telling you what to do – ASL, no wait, AVT… but do you know what is the scariest? Those that say “do whatever you want, each method is equally good – but the difference in the success of the method is YOU, THE PARENT”. That’s what our doctors, early interventionists, and parent advocates told us – that it was US that would make the difference. It would have been easier if the professionals would have said “Method A is best.” Then we could have had someone else to blame if our son fails. However, we don’t. If he fails, it is our fault.
Barb DiGi // January 16, 2008 at 11:37 am
Welcome to the blogosphere! It is interesting to read your posting and listening to the other commenters. I know this is a very sensitive issue for all of us, both hearing and Deaf. One thing for sure we all have in common, we CARE about our children.
Generally, it is much harder and less possible for a profoundly Deaf person to learn and use intelligible speech than it is for a hearing person to learn ASL.
Kathleen // January 22, 2008 at 10:06 am
As a former ASL interpreter, I now work as a director of a child care center. I have been teaching hearing children sign language from infancy through pre-kindergarten. I have seen more and more hearing people’s attitudes change about sign language. It seems as if more people admire the visual beauty of the language and fewer make degrading remarks associating a “non-spoken” language to a lack of intelligence. Ok, maybe it’s not happening as fast as we’d like it to among the medical community, but the more children are exposed to sign language in general, the more likely they are to be open-minded toward it as adults. If we are lucky, they will be the adults who become the next generation of doctors, educators, policy makers and parents of deaf children! We all have the potential to make changes for future generations!!! Keep up the good work.