Lizzie, What are you using for ASL?

[Kelley]

I was reading your post under the 7th grade ideas..and noticed the ASL.

What are you using for this?

My daughter has a keen interest in learning this. Some day she may want to go to school to be an interpreter.

Kelley

[Rosie_0801]

Being in Australia I can't help much. I wouldn't have a clue what products are available for ASL. However, I suggest you try contacting your local deaf association and ask them who produces the teaching materials used in classes. Explain that you are a homeschooling family who has no experience. Some resources are virtually useless unless you have a fluent signer working through it with you. You may find taking classes or getting a tutor will be more worthwhile. Someone who is used to teaching, or has learned as an adult will be more helpful than a random deaf person. Although it depends if you are wanting to study the language, or just learn to converse. There's a big difference. If your girl wants to be an interpreter, she needs to study the language, as she'll need excellent skills, not merely conversation. Language ability is not the same as interpreting ability. I'm a fluent signer, but am a lousy interpreter. If I really wanted to learn, I could take an interpreters class and improve my skills, but it's not something that comes naturally, and a class wouldn't guarentee that I would become a proficient interpreter.
If you were asking about Auslan, I'd be able to help much more! Oh, and before buying any products, check to make sure they are suited to your area. Australia has dialect differences, so I assume ASL does too. Sometimes the differences are large, sometimes they are minor. It's best to check :)
Rosie

[Kelley]

thanks for the ideas...
kelley

[MomOfOneFunOne]

Hi, Kelly. My MS. is in Deaf Ed. so I do not have a backgroud in an interpreter training program (ITP). Also, I have had exactly ONE ASl class. So, everything I say should be viewed in light of this information. FWIW! :p

I am a nationally certified interpreter. When I came to be expecting my daughter, I knew I wouldn't want to teach anymore. I sign with "native-like fluency" which is woefully uncommon among teachers of the Deaf. When I left off teaching, I decided to interpret as a means of getting out a bit and bringing in some money. I LOVE IT!!!! It is a tremendously fun job to have with all the flexibility one could want. At least, this is true of private practice 'terps.

There are just a few things I would want you to know about learning ASL.

1) ASL is a language and it takes the same kind of dilegent work as any other language.

2) As far as I am aware, there are NO good materials for Asl language instruction for children. I've looked!

3) If your daughter is mature enough to use those materials used in college classrooms, and she may be, it's almost impossible, nay, I say impossible, to learn a multi-dimensional language from a single dimensional drawing. You need a teacher. Sometimes I look at those pictures and eventhough I know the word and the sign, I can't figure out the picture!

4) To my mind, :rolleyes:, the single most important tool for learning ASL or any other language is . . . dare I say it . . . Self-Abasement! As I said, I'm fluent in the language and yet have only had a single ASL class. It's very much like a wee bird learning to fly. Just jump and be willing to see what happens. I had the good fortune to live near a boarding school with deaf students. I volunteered at the concession stands every sporting season, I volunteered for the Deaf club. I volunteered for everything I could think of and everything they'd let me do. I had a willingness to learn and be giggled at for wrong signs or crazily misconstrued grammar.

I tried to teach a homeschool ASL class. It was a bust for want of material. I tried to make my own using a unit studies approach. For example: Sea Animals. I got a book of sea animals; cut and pasted together a few pages of signs from a dictionary; cut and pasted together a discussion of one grammar highlight; planned a field trip. It turned into too much work for me to do all that making of the book. My daughter loved it, though. I sat the class down and we discussed the sea animals with the book. We talked about how each one looked and how it moved. We used our bodies to move and discuss these things. Then we talked about the signs I wanted to introduce. I remember we also learned the signs for spotted and striped and a few other appearance signs and motion signs. We then played a game guessing the animal we each signed. The next week we went to the aquarium. One unit we did Christmas signs and then went to a pre-school class of Deaf students and volunteered to lead the class in a craft. When we learned the ABCs we invited a Deaf guy to come tell us ASL ABC stories (a uniquely Deaf culture storytelling device).

It was a HUGE amount of work on my part and if you can get someone to do that, please consider paying a good amount for it. I did it gratis and began pretty soon to feel quite disgruntled when the families didn't even bother to save the pages in a notebook for practicing.

If you get someone to teach one of the texts, you may be able to get a volunteer. It just depends on the community and any one person's circumstances. All professions require continuing education work and 'terps are no different. An up-and-coming interpreter may be able to teach your class gratis in exchange for a bit of paper work that would enable her to get some CEUs.

I can't remember the names of the text books used here but if you're interested, I'll look them up. Chances are, if you get a recent grad she'll want to use what she used in school and you could go with that. There is probably an interpreter referral agency in your area. Contact them and see if they can hook you up with someone or offer classes. Many offer community classes. Truly, this agency will probably be your best bet. If you can't find one, let me know where you live and I'll see if I can find out who's closest to you.

rebecca

[Kelley]

Rebecca,
Thanks so much for taking the time to post regarding ASL.
I really enjoyed reading your comments.
My daughter is really interested in this. I would love to have ASL be her Language study for the high school years.
You have given me food for thought in regards to how to pursue this career and training.
My daughter is currently a 7th grader. She took one class in our co-op and absolutely loved it! She signed a Christmas song for our co-op Christmas Program. My daughter loves to dance and I could see the beauty of her signing, when she signed for the Christmas Program. Sign Language is a beautiful language.
I feel that I need to do the research now, prior to the high school years.
Do you feel that Sign's for His Glory and/Interax Video Sign Language Course offered in the Timberdoodle catalog have any value?
I am going to print off your last post and try to do some more research.
Any other guidance you can give would be well appreciated.
Many Blessings to you and your past efforts in teaching others,
Kelley

[MomOfOneFunOne]

Kelly, I'll look at the catalogue but unless I can find a way to look through it and evaluate it based on content, I'm not sure what I can tell you. My experience with most things designed for children is that it's all fluff and no content.

At any rate, I'll have a look at the catalogue and ask around. I'll let you know if I find out anything of interest.
r

[Kelley]

Rebecca,
Thanks so much! I really appreciate it.
Kelley

[Rosie_0801]

Try to say "ASL" instead of "sign language" when you mean ASL. There's a whole world full of signed languages! Don't believe any product that claims to be a complete course in any signed language. Believe me, it's not possible to make such a thing. Please, don't be so silly as to call it a foreign language like the Timberdoodle people! American Sign Language, funnily enough, is American and not at all foreign. :)

It's certainly no use to buy books to learn a moving language. I'm having a squizz at the Timberdoodle products. The Interax course sounds fine for vocab, but makes no mention of the non vocab signs or grammar. The "Signing Time" sounds like a fun thing for little kids, but again, just vocab. Unsurprisingly, singing isn't a very deaf thing to do. It's more of a hearing people who can sign, or hard of hearing thing. It's probably nice for getting little kids interested, but that's about it. One does need to learn sentence structure if one wants to learn a language. If you're happy with keyword signing, it's fine. Learning signed languages with the volume on is a bad idea. You think it's helping you learn, but it's not. It's helping you understand, which is not good. You're supposed to be learning with your eyes not your ears. I wouldn't go with the Signs of his Glory as a beginners tool even if I was Christian :) It may be of value later on as a way to encourage conversational use of the language.
The only thing I've found that I would even consider is the Bravo ASL! series. Hopefully you can find someone who has seen it to comment. I would pick this though, as it's the only one to have mentioned the magic words "grammar" and "culture." Anything that doesn't involve those magic words is for play, not serious language learning.
Good luck in your endeavours!
Rosie- the resident Auslan user :)

[Kelley]

Thank you Rosie for your guidance on ASL. That is really what I was inferring to in my above posts...(ASL)

Do you think it is a benefit to learn "vocabulary" prior to really learning all of the aspects of ASL as a language?

As I was typing one of my above posts I knew that ASL wasn't considered a foreign language, but for many it satisfies the "so called foreign language requirement" for graduation. I knew it would read funny when I typed it.

I think that ASL is a beautiful language and one that can benefit others. A way of using our hands (gifts from God) to help others communicate in a hearing world.

Thanks for the book suggestion, I plan to look that up. I too feel that it is important to learn all of these different aspects of the world in which the deaf/and those who cannot speak inhabit. I do know that there are many Community College classes on the subject.

Thanks again for your helpful insight.
Kelley

[ShelzNH]

Maybe it is not foreign as in "from another country" but I also think of a foreign language as any language which is not your own. IAW: It is foreign to you. (just a thought) Timberdoodle is probably just trying to accomodate their customers by putting the products in a category that most people would look for it under. Sorry, I love Timberdoodle so I have to stick up for them!(insert lighthearted chuckle here! :)) My sister is a Speech Therapist and fluent in ASL and Pidgin. She has told me that the greatest thing you can do to prepare a child to learn sign is to teach them the alphabet. Since a large percentage of signs are variations of the letters. Once they are fluent in the alphabet you can move on much more easily. Grammar is a little tricky to learn. But I would worry about vocab, at least to start.

[Kelley]

Thanks Quinn, for your gentle guidance.:)

Kelley

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

I took one semester of ASL in college. The text we used was A Basic Course in American Sign Language and it came with a vocabulary tape. The text includes vocabulary and the grammar of the language and it was a big help to be able to see someone doing the signs on the video. As others have said, it's not really something to do by yourself. If nothing else, I would recommend at least you doing it with her. And maybe when she has practiced a little she can find some people in your community who also use the language that she can meet with. Good luck!

[Rosie_0801]

Oh sure, start with the letters and numbers. ASL has a LOT of initialised signs, so handshape will give you a big hint as to the meaning. Vocab is good :) I was never out to say it wasn't, I just think too much early focus on vocab, if you are not getting the other elements like classifiers, is counterproductive to the way you ought to be training yourself to think. We are English speakers so we like words. We use words all day long. Words usually have simple translations into other languages so we can feel comfortable with them. The problem with this word focus in a signed language is that you will lock yourself into signing in English word order, which isn't good for you. The earlier you can start good habits, the less time you are going to spend unlearning bad ones, and we already have bad ones by virtue of being English speakers. It's not just signs that you need to learn, it's a whole new language culture. What I mean by that is in English, we're encouraged to get to the point as fast as possible. In Auslan, and I assume every other signed language, you have to set up the situation first. It's a bit like signing an introduction to your conversation the same as you write an introduction to an academic essay. You have to tell what you are going to talk about, before you can. Sometimes you have to tell people where things are and what they look like before you can actually talk about it!
I think I may be waffling, and I'm not sure if you are going to understand what I'm saying, but I assure you it's very important! :D To learn the language, vocab isn't enough. To make your signing look beautiful, as you said, you need the rest of the language. If you ever get the opportunity to contrast a story told in Signed English (or any other such varient) and the same story in ASL, you'll see what I mean. Signed English looks sooooo boooorrrriiiinnng in comparison because it doesn't have classifiers, role shift and visual vernacular. I suppose the equivelent boringness in English would be a poker faced person droning away in monotone.
Ok, I think I'm getting annoying now, I'll stop.
:)
Rosie- who's vote is still going to Bravo ASL! Hopefully your library has it.

[Kelley]

Hi Rosie,
I just did a search at my library and they have the Videotapes (15), not the coursebooks. We are one of 5 libraries in the state to have these. I feel fortunate to be able to check them out, for the curriculum itself is $1000.00!!!
I will check out the first video this week on our weekly trek to the library.


Kelley

[Kelley]

Hi Lisa,
I noticed that our public Library has the book that you used in your college class. I willl take a peak at it when we go this week.
Kelley

[Lizzie in Ma]

A group of us hired a teacher from the Rhode Island School for the Deaf. Unfortunately, there is no curriculum to it.
The younger set has this book to refresh their memory during the week
"You Can Learn Sign Language" ISBN0439635837
and the older set uses Sign Language Made Simple
ISBN 0385488572

If this had not been pulled together I was going to go with Signs for His Glory
http://www.timberdoodle.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=1178