ASL Skills, Fingerspelling Ability, Home
Communication Context and Early Alphabetic Knowledge of Preschool-Aged Deaf
Children
This article reports on a correlational study of language and home factors and
their role in fostering the development of alphabetic knowledge among a national
sample of 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old deaf children. A structural equation model was
constructed and tested in an examination of the combined impacts of student age,
fingerspelling ability, and receptive American Sign Language ability on the
participants’ ability to write, say, or sign letters of the English alphabet.
The resulting models explained more than half of the variance in letter-writing
ability and revealed significant independent effects of all three variables.
Additionally, ASL skill revealed noteworthy indirect effects through its impact
on fingerspelling, emphasizing the importance of the combination of signing and
fingerspelling as predictors of emergent literacy in young deaf children. A
follow-up analysis examined the correlations between age and letter writing, as
well as those between ASL skill and letter writing, separately for subgroups
(defined by parental hearing status and the use of sign in the home). This
analysis revealed strong associations between ASL skill and letter writing in
signing deaf and hearing families but not in nonsigning hearing families,
raising a concern that deaf children in families with no early exposure to a
visual language may be at greater risk for delay in their emerging reading
abilities.
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Mediating Native Swedish Sign Language:
First Language in Gestural Modality Interactions at Storytime
This qualitative, longitudinal, single-case study analyzes naturalistic
interactions in Swedish Sign Language. Multiple interactions took place mainly
between a mother and a deaf twin on twelve occasions. The participants’ actions
and language structure are examined as the child progressed from ten to forty
months of age. The results are presented in three segments: transformations
(i.e., types of actions during the sessions); gaze; and structure of utterances.
The first segment (when the child was between ten and thirteen months of age)
includes mediating utterances that contained a few signs with steady eye contact
(i.e., focus on an object with mediating, displaced signing, as from the
signer’s perspective). The second segment (when the child was between fifteen
and twenty-four months of age) includes flexible eye contact, multiple phrases,
and narrative structure. The third segment comprises conversations that include
a dynamic visual contact utilizing nonmanual structures. Mediating factors such
as simultaneous tactile looking, mediating vision, and mediating triangles,
which may be useful for pedagogical purposes, are emphasized.
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The Making of the Shillong Sign Language
Multimedia Lexicon (ShSL MML)
Despite the fact that Indian Sign Language (ISL) has a significant influence on
the native signers in northeastern India, no studies of ISL have yet taken into
account the nature of the sign languages in use in this region. This article
examines the emergence of both Shillong Sign Language and the Deaf community of
Shillong and discusses the development of the Shillong Sign Language Multimedia
Lexicon (ShSL MML).
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Errors and Feedback in the Beginner Auslan
Classroom
Although the literature on general characteristics of effective sign language
teaching is growing, relatively few studies have looked in detail at classroom
practices or classroom discourse. This article draws on detailed observations of
six beginner Australian Sign Language (Auslan) classes and postclass interviews
with the teachers in order to explore students’ errors and teacher feedback
strategies. In line with prior experimental studies it shows errors of movement
and handshape to be the most frequent type of mistakes and more phonologically
complex signs to be especially prone to errors. Teachers expressed varied
philosophies about error correction but were observed to correct mistakes at
generally equal frequencies in their classes. The article closes by reflecting
on the relationship between error-correction approaches and general teaching
methods and suggests areas where the curriculum may benefit from reform.
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On-Demand American Sign Language
Interprepting Services: Social Policy Development in the Yukon
In 2012, a two-year pilot project was implemented throughout the Yukon to
provide free, on-demand professional American Sign Language (ASL/English)
interpretation services to all members of the Deaf community. Following
extensive community consultation, this project was developed to meet a growing
concern that a denial of ASL interpretation services was limiting the ability of
Deaf Yukoners to exercise their rights of citizenship. After eight months, the
first project evaluation indicated enhanced communications in medical services,
employment, and quality-of-life activities for a majority of Deaf community
members in the Yukon.
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