Where Does Speech Fit In? Spoken English in a Bilingual Context
Sign vs. Speech
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Where Does Speech Fit In? Spoken English in a Bilingual Context Sign vs. Speech
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About the Author Is He Still Talking? Factors Involved in Spoken English Development Sign vs. Speech Realistic Expectations Using Bilingual Strategies Conclusion References Sharing Ideas Home Page |
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If there are no concrete objective methods to predict the child's potential, then how can one determine whether a very young child
will have the ability to develop spoken English skills?
Traditionally, if parents wanted their child to develop speech skills, they were told not to use sign language with their child.
After several years of speech training, if a child did not succeed, then sign language could be taught as a back-up method.
Currently, sign language is widely used in the education of deaf and hard of hearing children (American Annals of the Deaf, 1997). However, there is still a strong belief that children who sign will not learn to speak, especially if they are exposed to ASL. The effects of this misconception can be devastating to the child's welfare. The opposite view is that a child should be primarily exposed only to sign language and that spoken English skills could be taught after the child has mastered his or her first language (ASL). With these either/or approaches, a child receives exposure to only one language, limiting the potential language development of the child. By placing a child in a bilingual environment that is truly sensitive to spoken language issues, one where the two languages are used in similar contexts but kept separate, parents and teachers have more information to determine what the child is capable of achieving. Language development is one of the priorities of any early education program. Since access to spoken language is limited for a child who is deaf or hard of hearing, one way to provide full access to language is to use a visual language. Within the school day, as well as in their home environment, the children can also be exposed to spoken English in safe, predictable contexts. In this way they can be exposed to both languages separately during the course of everyday interactions. It then becomes possible to more clearly observe progress in each language, both expressive and receptive. When determining a child's potential to develop spoken English skills, it is important to follow the child's lead-to let the child help us determine where his or her abilities, preferences, and language input needs lie (Mahshie, 1995, 1997). One natural question would seem to be, why not use both spoken English and signs at the same time? In fact, this premise is the basis for the popularly-used form of classroom communication known as simultaneous communication or "sim com." A number of artificially-developed sign systems based on English began to emerge in the 1960s, along with the hope that this would be the solution to many problems in deaf education. The purpose was to manually show English while speaking at the same time. It is not within the scope of this paper to discuss the theoretical and practical disadvantages of this method; there is an excellent discussion in chapter three of Educating Deaf Children Bilingually (Mahshie, 1995). However, I will note that, from my experience, students who are able to produce spoken English separate from signing are better communicators than students who attempt to speak and sign at the same time. Keeping the languages separate allows deaf and hard of hearing children to function like other bilingual children. They are able to make decisions regarding the most appropriate mode to use in a given situation. Also, speech sessions that focus on spoken English rather than simultaneous communication allow the child to practice spoken English in a more realistic communication environment, with the goal of communicating with typical mainstream Americans-people who do not know sign language. Keeping the languages separate also helps clinicians and teachers to more accurately assess the intelligibility of the child's speech production without signed cues, and to better observe his or her comprehension of the spoken signal. In this way, children also begin to get a clearer understanding of when their speech is being understood and when it is not. Approaching the languages as they are-separate languages-enables the children to realistically assess their own abilities in each; it also contributes to overall communicative competency by helping children know when they need to develop alternative strategies.
Contact Ken Kurlychek with comments or suggestions about this web page. Last modified May 4, 1998 Copyright © 1997 All Rights Reserved Laurent Clerc National Deaf Education Center
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