Deals for sign language

Cyber Monday is tomorrow!  I don't get into it quite as much as I do Black Friday.  My goal is to have my shopping done by December 1, and this year I am.  I also was able to grab a laptop for my daughter for Christmas.  The two of us stood in line for about 3 hours before we were #19 of 26 people who were able to get a $198 laptop.  My daughter is thrilled, and that makes me happy!

As for sign language items....I've searched around for Cyber deals for Monday.  As you kow I love Signing Time and this year they are offering 40% off by just logging onto their site:
http://www.signingtime.com/?utm_source=Signing+Time+News&utm_campaign=038fee1d40-cybermonday_reminder_2011&utm_medium=email&mc_cid=038fee1d40&mc_eid=62f4200ac5

I'm sure there is something for everyone.  So if you ever wanted to get some Signing Time videos for your class, or some books, right now is the best time to get some items for yourself and/or your classroom.  Plus, another new feature to the site is the ability to download music onto your computer. 
http://www.signingtime.com/ondemand/

How cool is that?! 

What a cool cookbook!

I thought it would be interesting to look online and see if there was a cookbook that incorporated sign language and could be used for deaf children, low level adults, or those who are ESL.

http://web.mac.com/jjoyce3/iWeb/The%20Visual%20Language%20Cookbook/the%20visual%20language%20cookbook%20-%20sign%20language.html

This book would be a really wonderful addition to a classroom that may use cooking as a social skill. 

Or as a game booklet!
http://web.mac.com/jjoyce3/iWeb/Index%20For%20Play%20It%20By%20Sign/play%20it%20by%20sign-%20index.html

Remember it's never too early to learn sign language.  This picture taken from babysigns, is awesome!

SIgn language in other languages

English is not the only language that uses sign language.  Just like the US where English is not the only language that is spoken, sign language is different in each language too.  I check around to see what links I could come up to see the kinds of sign language that are spoken in countries speifically in Spanish speaking countries.  I was also looking for other sign language dictionaries.  I was thrilled when I found this link: http://deafness.about.com/cs/signfeats2/a/spanishsign.htm

An excerpt from that site..."Andorra is a very small country between France and Spain with a population of under 100,000. One resource indicates that Andora has fewer than 5,000 deaf. I can not find any resources for a specialized sign language for Andorra. Belize is another small country, with a population under 300,000; its deaf population is under 15,000."

I also found a picture that shows the Spanish alphabet so you can compare it with the American Sign Language alphabet. 

I hope you find this interesting and can incorporate it into an ESL class if you have deaf and/or hard of hearing students.  Or in a class where you are teaching both English and Spanish.  What a fun way to teach both languages!  Enjoy!

Sign language in history

I fully believe all children regardless of ability or disbaility have the right to an appropriate public education.  I don't think schools should look at a child and say "they are doing just fine without a(an)..." just to save the district some money.  If they can advance more by get a(an) "insert here" then they should get it.  In the 1980s, there was a court case that discussed this very topic.  Amy was a child who was hard of hearing and was doing well in school without the aid of an interpreter.  Her parents (who were deaf) wanted her to have an interpreter, as there wasn't a way for her to get 100% of the information all the time.  The school said that because she was doing well in class there wasn't a need for her to have an interpreter:

"This case arose in connection with the education of Amy Rowley, a deaf student at the Furnace Woods School in the Hendrick Hudson Central School District, Peekskill, New York. Amy has minimal residual hearing and is an excellent lip reader. During the year before she began attending furnace Woods, a meeting between her parents and school administrators resulted in a decision to place in a regular kindergarten class in order to determine what supplement services would be necessary to her education. Several members of the school administration prepared for Amy's arrival by attending a course in sign-language interpretation, and a teletype machine was installed in the principal's office to facilitate communication with her parents who are also deaf.

At the end of the trial period it was determined that Amy should remain in the kindergarten class, but that she should be provided with an FM hearing aid which would amplify words spoken into a wireless receiver by the teacher or fellow students during certain classroom activities. Amy successfully completed her kindergarten year.

As required by the Act, an IEP was prepared for Amy during the fall of her first-grade year. The IEP provided that Amy should be educated in a regular classroom at Furnace Woods, should continue to use the FM hearing aid, and should receive instruction from a tutor for the deaf for one hour each day and from a speech therapist for three hours each week. The Rowleys agreed with the IEP but insisted that Amy also be provided a qualified sign-language interpreter in all of her academic classes. Such an interpreter had been placed in Amy's kindergarten class for a two-week experimental period, but the interpreter had reported that Amy did not need his services at that time. The school administrators likewise concluded that Amy did not need such an interpreter in her first-grade classroom. They reached this conclusion after consulting the school district's Committee on the Handicapped, which had received expert evidence from Amy's parents on the importance of a sign-language interpreter, received testimony from Amy's teacher and other persons familiar with her academic and social progress, and visited a class for the deaf.

When their request for an interpreter was denied, the Rowleys demanded and received a hearing before an independent examiner. After receiving evidence from both sides, the examiner agreed with the administrators' determination that an interpreter was not necessary because "Amy was achieving educationally, academically, and socially" without such assistance. App. to Pet. for Cert. F-22. The examiner's decision was affirmed on appeal by the New York Commissioner of Education on the basis of substantial evidence in the record. Id., at E-4. Pursuant to the Act's provision for judicial review, the Rowleys then brought an action in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, claiming that the administrators' denial of the sign-language interpreter constituted a denial of the "free appropriate public education" guaranteed by the Act.

The District Court found that Amy "is a remarkably well adjusted child" who interacts and communicates well with her classmates and has "developed an extraordinary rapport" with her teachers. It also found that "she performs better than the average child in her class and is advancing easily from grade to grade, but "that she understands considerably less of what goes on in class than she would if she were not deaf" and thus "is not learning as much, or performing as well academically, as she would without her handicap. This disparity between Amy's achievement and her potential led the court to decide that she was not receiving a "free appropriate public education" which the court defined as "an opportunity to achieve [her] full potential commensurate with the opportunity provided to other children. According to the District Court, such a standard "requires that the potential of the handicapped child be measured and compared to his or her performance, and that the remaining differential or 'shortfall' be compared to the shortfall experienced by nonhandicapped children.' Ibid. The District Court's definition arose from its assumption that the responsibility for "giving content to the requirement of an 'appropriate education'" had 'been left entirely to the federal courts and the hearing officers.'

A divided panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed. The Court of Appeals "agree[d] with the [D]istrict [C]ourt's conclusions of law," and held that its 'findings of fact [were] not clearly erroneous." 632 F. 2d 945, 947 (1980).

We granted certiorari to review the lower courts' interpretation of the Act. Such review requires us to consider two questions: What is meant by the Act's requirement of a "free appropriate public education"? And what is the role of state and federal courts in exercising the review granted by 1415 of the Act?"

In the end, did Amy win.  No.  The justification given by the court then was that a high-achieving deaf child or teen does not need additional services. No thought is given to the fact that deafness is a communication disability, and the fact that without an interpreter a deaf student will miss much of what goes on in a hearing classroom.

Information on this is extracted from http://deafness.about.com/cs/schooling/a/amyrowleycase.htm

More resources!

Ok, so it's been a while since I last gave you some information on sign language in your classroom.  I went on vacation and then the whole family was sick....so now it's back to sign language and filling you with all of the amazing information the internet has for you!

I love the books "...For Dummies".  There must be one for everything and everyone.  I like them because you know someone else out there is feeling the same way you are and are scare to ask anyone about it.  So I wanted to see if there really was a book of sign language for dummies, and there is! 

http://www.dummies.com/how-to/education-languages/languages-cultures/sign-language.html

Or what about a SmartBoard activity to use in the morning when your kids get the school. Most of the teachers I know will use it for attendance or for white or chocolate milk choices, or even which book they will read for circle time.  How about this great video?

Another fun game that almost every student likes is hangman!  How about incorporating that into a daily spelling challenge?

http://www.aslpro.com/games/hangman/hangman.html

We live in a world with so many wonderful resources for us to use and share.  I hope I have given you some more avenues to travel as you incorporate sign language into yours and your students' daily lives.  Enjoy!