Language and the Deaf

1. Language and the Deaf Session 8, March 7, 2012 Jessica Scott Boston University

2. Food for Thought • Watch me when people say deaf and dumb, or deaf mute, and I give them a look like you might get if you called Denzel Washington the wrong name. • Marlee Matlin

3. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

4. Goals for the Session • To understand the connection between Vygotsky and the Whole Language approach to teaching • To consider the role that social interaction plays in developing literacy skills • To apply these concepts to a classroom with Deaf students who use ASL

5. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

6. Discussion! • The basic idea of whole language instruction is that students should be immersed in literacy in meaningful ways. What might this look like? • Why is play important for a child’s development? How is this related to the idea of social transaction? • What might a whole language to teach English literacy skills to Deaf students look like? • Why are the concepts of invention and convention important for language development?

7. Discussion! • “Instead of adjusting school to the learners, we require the learners to adjust to the school.” (p. 234). Responses to this? How can we adjust school to fit the needs of the learners? • What do you think of the two classrooms described on page 237? • How can we find ways to empower students who are traditionally not well served by the educational system using whole language? Including, but not limited to, Deaf students.

8. Discussion board interlude • "What the child can do in cooperation today he can do alone tomorrow. therefore the only good kind on instruction is that which marches ahead of development and leads it; it must be aimed not so much at the ripe but as at the ripening functions" (Vygotsky 1962). ---I really liked those quote. It makes perfect sense. We need to teach children skills that they can later carry out themselves individually. This idea is important for children to be self learners.

9. The article on the other hand discusses this idea of "whole language". It seems as though the United States is lacking in this area of "whole language" learning. This concept draws on all foundational disciplines, but yet the US is too curriculum driven to be up to par with this. • As for the article, whole-language is a teaching style that I remembered from before I came here to BU. I distinctly remember two of my professors telling me that the this approach lead to the reading failure of many students simply because it didn't stress, or even specifically teach, phonics. Of course now I am not in a program in which phonics would be a helpful way to teach reading, so I think that I will stick with a whole-language approach.

10. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

11. Important Vygotskian Ideas • Zone of proximal development: Teaching students something that is just above their independent ability level. Used in guided reading (texts should be at a level that is in the students’ ZPD) • Teacher support in the ZPD should depend on student ability and needs (more or less support can be provided) • Support is meant to guide students to learning and becoming more independent in the activity they are attempting

12. Important Vygotskian Ideas • Social transaction: Students learn best when interacting with others • Schema: The way learners organize concepts. As students learn new things, they must reorganize or adapt their schema • Do you believe that ZPD, social transaction and schema are easily applied to Deaf students? Why or why not?

13. What is the role of the teacher? • To create opportunities for learning and experience • To guide and support students in exploring, making mistakes, and learning from them • To watch children and learn from them what they are ready for

14. Development and Vygotsky • Children develop through social interaction with others • Through social interactions, students begin to internalize what they have learned (i.e., reading behaviors) until they are able to apply these independently • Concepts are organized by increasingly advanced mental categorizations (heaps, complexes, potential concepts and genuine concepts) • Concept webs can be a visual way to organize these categories

15. Conceptual Categories

16. Behaviorism versus Constructivism Behaviorism Constructivism Children learn from experimentation with ideas and objects Children are active constructors of knowledge The teacher learns from the child as the child learns from the teacher • Children learn from stimulus-response (positive reinforcements) • Children are passive in their learning • Children copy what they hear or see in their environment

17. Vygotsky and Reading • Children are guided by a teacher to develop print knowledge as they are ready for it (ZPD) • This begins with learning about what books are for, how to hold them, concepts of print, and continues to decoding, sight word recognition, and comprehension

18. Mediation Model of Reading Instruction

19. So… • Children need to engage in social experiences around literacy • We must model what we expect students to internalize • We must give students the opportunity to practice

20. What did you think of the examples? • With a partner or two, look over the two teaching examples on pages 22-24 • What did you think about how the teacher prompted the student? • Do you think this type of instruction would be helpful for the student? • How can you see this playing out in a classroom with Deaf students?

21. Steps in the Mediation Model • 1: Rehearsal of new text • Go through the text with the child, consider what he/she needs to know to understand the story • Familiarize the student with the story • What strategies will be helpful? • Reflect on how students respond to the introduction • 2: Assisted Reading • Model fluent reading – by signing the story in ASL and occasionally referring to important parts of the text • Guide students in their reading

22. Mediating Writing • Language Experience Approach: Teacher writes down children’s ideas in a whole class setting • Innovating: Using a text children know to make up their own stories in the same style or pattern • Individual writing: Students have the opportunity to explore writing independently

23. Discussion • This book provides many ideas for social interaction in teaching and learning • Text rehearsing, assisted reading, language experience approach • Do you think there are any modifications that would need to be made for a Deaf Education classroom using ASL? • In terms of approach? • In terms of interaction? • In terms of language use?

24. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

25. Break!

26. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

27. CI Corner • Cochlear implants in prelingually deaf children • By Rose, Vernon and Pool • American Annals of the Deaf, 1996 • Two authors are audiologists, one is a psychologist

28. CI Corner • What did they do? • Surveyed all schools for the deaf with at least 100 students about student CI usage • They identified 64 schools, and 45 of them completed the survey • The schools reported having 151 children who had cochlear implants • Remember, this is 1996..

29. CI Corner • What did they find? • Almost half (47%) of the children had stopped using their CIs • Which supports the case for bilingual early intervention among children with CIs, as these children who do not use them use ASL • Do you think these findings would be the same today? (15 years later!)

30. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

31. Practice: Vygotsky in Action • This book provides several examples of Vygotsky’s theories applied to the classroom • In groups of three, you will look at one example in depth and consider: • How is interaction important in this example? • How is the teacher supporting student learning? • What about this example is a good fit for Deaf students? • What about this example might need to be modified for Deaf students?

32. Practice: Vygotsky In Action • The three examples are: • Rehearsal Illustration (29-30) • Assisted Shared Reading Illustration (34-36) • Shared Writing Experience Illustration (38-39) • You will have 15-20 minutes to explore this example in detail with your group, and then we will discuss them as a whole class

33. Agenda • Discussion • Vygotsky and instruction • Break • CI Corner • Practice: Applying Vygotsky to the classroom • Housekeeping

34. Annotated Bibliography • Due March 28 • 5 readings on the topic of your final paper • 300 word (or less) commentary describing each reading and how it applies to your final paper • In APA format! • The rubric is in the syllabus!

35. Reminders • Proposal due between March 21 (the next day we meet) and April 11 • Also, does anyone have a paper copy of their second essay to turn in?

36. Next class session • We will be talking about the development of literate thought • Betsy will be leading the class discussion • We MIGHT have our second guest speaker, an ASL specialist from The Learning Center • But this is not completely confirmed yet. 

37. Have a great spring break!!