What Deaf Children Need to Learn: Teachers' Folk Models in

1
What Deaf Children Need to Learn Teachers' Folk
Models in England, the U.S. and Mexico

• Rachel Sutton-Spence
• Claire Ramsey

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International collaboration

• From Claire, thanks to the Hans Rausing
  Endangered Languages Program
• From Rachel, thanks to the World Universities
  Network and the University of Bristol
• From us both, thanks to the teachers we
  interviewed and to EDS for hosting Rachel and
  being EDS

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Our original objectives

• Conduct a cross-linguistic and cross-cultural
  investigation of the role played by Deaf teachers
  in passing Deaf folklore on to deaf children in
  Britain, Mexico and the USA to identify
• elements that are quintessentially Deaf
  irrespective of the national culture
• elements that are specific to the particular
  national linguistic, cultural, educational and
  social traditions

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Our focus for today

• Present some Deaf teachers folk models of what
  children need to learn, following analysis of
  interviews from the three countries
• Identify themes arising from what Deaf teachers
  have told us in response to questions about
  creative use of signing in the classroom

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Folk Lore

• The Folk - may be any people in an
  identifiable community with their own culture
• The Lore - is related to the materials that
  carry the knowledge of a groups experience,
  described by origin, form, transmission and
  function. It is traditionally considered to be
  primarily unwritten

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Model? Folk model?

• A simplified version of reality.
• A limited aspect of the total world.
• No models reveal the truth of the structure of
  reality.
• Each model reveals and orders reality from a
  particular perspective.

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Signlore and Deaflore

• Signlore is the explicit use of sign language to
  reflect a Deaf cultures folklore.
• Deaflore refers to sign poetry, Deaf jokes,
  legends, riddles, stories, personal experience
  narratives and all the linguistic play that come
  under the sub-category of signlore. (Carmel,
  1996)

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The Butler did it!

• Detective novels give all the evidence first and
  then tell you whodunnit
• Research reports should spoil a good mystery and
  reveal all at the start, then provide evidence

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Themes emerging from data

• Deaf folk beliefs for teaching are not identical
  across national boundaries but
• Reports of teaching based on assumptions about
  Deaf ways of learning are remarkably similar in
  all three countries
• Descriptions of the Deaf place in the world occur
  in the three countries but are rather different
  in each

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National differences What can a deaf child
expect at school?

• England some Deaf or sign contact, Communication
  support workers, post-secondary opportunity
• USA - good chance for sign contact, chance of
  Deaf contact, potential for movement between
  residential public schools, interpreters (if
  needed), post-secondary opportunity
• Mexico - very little Deaf or sign contact,
  limited tradition of Deaf Education, about 6
  years of school, no HS, no post secondary
  opportunity

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Opportunities for Deaf people to get teaching
credential? In England

• Of approx 2000 Teachers of the Deaf, 5 reported
  a hearing impairment. Re Deaf signers I do
  not think it is a large number (BATOD)
• Bachelor of Education, Post-Graduate Certificate
  of Education or Registered Teacher Programme
• A trainee should usually be
• A qualified teacher who is effective and
  competent
• An effective spoken language communicator with
  clear lip patterns

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Opportunities for Deaf people to get teaching
credential? In USA

• Many opportunities for HS graduates who are
  admissible to BA programs, or for college
  graduates who are admissible to graduate programs
• Signing teacher candidates can be admitted and
  are sometimes sought
• 22 of teachers of the deaf are deaf (Simms et
  al., 2008)
• Current concern is to increase diversity of Deaf
  teacher pool

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Opportunities for Deaf people to get teaching
credential? In Mexico

• No national teachers organization, no published
  requirements or standards
• Entry into normal school or university requires
  HS graduation
• signing Deaf people have no opportunity to become
  teachers w/credentials
• Some opportunity in private LSM-medium schools,
  little opportunity in public schools

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Method

• Open-ended, flexible interview protocol, topics
  of discussion adjusted by country
• Data are exploratory, not observational, probably
  not generalizable
• Our positionality re the interviewees
• Analysis multiple reads, coding, categorizing

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Participants

• Two from each country, all Deaf signing adults
  with minimum of three years teaching experience
• England Richard Carter and Paul Scott
• USA Tom Humphries and Robert Weiniger
• Mexico Linda (raised oral, some university,
  former graphic designer) and Carmen (middle
  school graduate, now working on HS), both late
  learners (Linda 20s, Carmen teens)
• Only the U.S. teachers have teaching credentials
• Richard Nobody taught me the right rules. I
  just know and feel.

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Assumptions about Deaf Learning and Teaching

• How deaf children learn
• By being engaged
• By participating in the group
• By using language
• What deaf children need to learn
• To communicate and interact
• To have fun with signing
• To see what is possible for deaf people

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Deaf place in the world

• Distance from hearing people
• US - very marked and explicit
• UK- very marked and explicit w/attempts to shrink
• Mexico - minimally marked, inexplicit, very
  little perceived distance to shrink

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Teachers place teaching practices in contrasting
frameworks

• USA clear expression of intentional use of
  signed folklore to promote English literacy
• England familiarity with concepts such as Deaf
  Culture, sign linguistics, Deafhood, used with
  intention to teach confidence and self-esteem
• Mexico - no use of Deaf Culture as a construct,
  intentional practices to foster interaction and
  sign communication

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Deaf ways of teaching

• Based on assumptions about deaf ways of learning
• Do something nominally independent of language
• Show something through a story or creative
  activity
• Say something tell another child
• Teacher offers model and then has the children DO
  something with language
• Encourage children to use language
• Encourage children to interact

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Forewarned, so forearmed

• Deaf teachers know what deaf children are likely
  to know, and their likely mistakes and
  misconceptions (hearing teachers may not know
  this)
• What child will do when told to Start again in
  a story
• Expect explicit indications of understanding
  rather than nod or repetition
• Understanding when children need to copy signs
• Understanding why new signers do not know how to
  participate w/Deaf and how to include them

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Showing and Saying

• Mapping the familiar onto the unfamiliar
• Lindas bear
• Knowing what the children already know to build
  on
• Pauls spelling lessons
• Carmen asking a child to explain to another child
• Knowing what the children dont already know to
  build on

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Sign Play US and UK

• Knowing how to create visually appealing
  metaphors
• Roberts volcano
• Knowing how to create visually appealing signs
• Richards bear
• Knowing how to create linguistically demanding
  signs
• Knowing how to relate signs to English
• Mexico teachers did not tell about sign play.

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Using stories

• Stories are teaching tools
• to explain
• to define Richards emotion words
• to illustrate
• Linda - social values
• Carmen - what Deaf can do
• Robert science (Volcano)
• Paul Deaf pride (deaf man on aeroplane)
• to entertain

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Deaf place in the world

• Deaf is us compared to them
• But distance between us and them differs across
  nations
• You cant be both Deaf and Hearing (Padden and
  Humphries, 1988)
• To understand being Deaf, you have to know about
  hearing

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Distance between us and them

• US - cultural and linguistic gap is marked
• England gap is marked
• Mexico - cultural and linguistic gap is barely
  marked fact of life.

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History of Deaf People

• Deaf people did these things before, so you can
  accomplish things too
• Paul Famous Deaf who prepared the way
• Carmen Marching to honor the flag, winning
  swimming competition

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Conclusion

• The Deaf teachers all pass on their cultural and
  linguistic knowledge to the children as best they
  can
• This knowledge is different in the three
  countries
• The folklore itself is different
• But the folk models for passing it on are
  remarkably similar (even when certified)

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Our next steps

• Article
• Folklore
• Abstract to upcoming TISLR
• Articles for teacher audience
• UK Deafness and Education International
• US - Odyssey
• Mexico - TBA (no publication for teachers of the
  deaf exists)