Thanks for your reaching out to our community with your question. Would you be able to share a little more about your learner population? What ESL level are your learners, and what is the context for the class, or program, in which they are enrolled? Any additional context you can provide would help members to brainstorm some possible resources to help you out.
Great question about the student population. I am a resource person at a university who is looking for materials for an adult ed program. In other words, I have no specifics on the student; I am not the teacher. In general, I can say the person is described as an adult ELL seeking services from a publicly-funded adult ed program serving ESOL EFL 1-6. I do not know whether the student is fluent in sign language; I do not know what the student's first language is or if they have reading and writing skills in any language.
So, I am looking for practical, instructional resources that might help the classroom teacher connect with this student and make him/her feel more a part of the class. I have searched the literature on language and deafness but would prefer resources that are more classroom-ready. Many TESOL practices are oral, which makes me think there might be some strategies for making instruction more visual. Does this help develop the context somewhat?
Thanks for adding this bit of context. It sounds like a lot isn't yet known about the learner's needs, but I would reach out to Gallaudet University, and their English Language Institute for curricular resources. While there doesn't appear to be any such resources available on the site, they should be able to help direct your teacher to resources that will help her welcome this student, assess his needs, and plan an appropriate curriculum.
We'd love to hear more about how it goes with this teacher's progress with her student, and integrating him into the general ESL population.
PANDA-Minnesota Adult Basic Education Disabilities Specialists has a wonderful website with an entire chapter on serving students who are deaf as well as students with various disabilities. Within each chapter are instructional strategies and resources. This website was developed for Adult Basic Education teachers in Minnesota. Here is the link on the chapter about hearing loss and deafness:
Thanks for sharing this site with us, Wendy! It has a lot of great information to support deaf and hard of hearing (HoH) learners. I was also sent this link to course for in the Community Education program, at Community College of Allegheny County (PA), which is for learners who are deaf or HoH. Hopefully these resources will give members some new ideas for working with this population. Please let us know how it goes, and share any other resources that you come across in your work.
It is possible with truespel phonetics to enable the deaf to SEE how to say words in US dictionary accent. Merely use the converter at http://truespel.com to paste in a paragraph and convert it to truespel phonetics.. The learner need only know how to relate 40 spellings to 40 sounds to be able to read any word in US English accent by reading the phonetics.. the teacher can display slang word pronunciation as well http://www.screenr.com/XOn8 .
Truespel is free with tutorials, converter and much phonetic information on US English on site. It's now being used for speech therapy. It's designed to make phonetics simple enough for children to read and write. This is important for learning reading http://justpaste.it/truequest . Also see video on phoneme frequency at http://bit.ly/2zjUHlt
Comments
Hi, Susan -
Thanks for your reaching out to our community with your question. Would you be able to share a little more about your learner population? What ESL level are your learners, and what is the context for the class, or program, in which they are enrolled? Any additional context you can provide would help members to brainstorm some possible resources to help you out.
Best,
Mike Cruse
Disabilities and Equitable Outcomes Moderator
michaelcruse74@gmail.com
Hi Michael
Great question about the student population. I am a resource person at a university who is looking for materials for an adult ed program. In other words, I have no specifics on the student; I am not the teacher. In general, I can say the person is described as an adult ELL seeking services from a publicly-funded adult ed program serving ESOL EFL 1-6. I do not know whether the student is fluent in sign language; I do not know what the student's first language is or if they have reading and writing skills in any language.
So, I am looking for practical, instructional resources that might help the classroom teacher connect with this student and make him/her feel more a part of the class. I have searched the literature on language and deafness but would prefer resources that are more classroom-ready. Many TESOL practices are oral, which makes me think there might be some strategies for making instruction more visual. Does this help develop the context somewhat?
Thank you for any information you can provide!
Hi, Wendy -
Thanks for adding this bit of context. It sounds like a lot isn't yet known about the learner's needs, but I would reach out to Gallaudet University, and their English Language Institute for curricular resources. While there doesn't appear to be any such resources available on the site, they should be able to help direct your teacher to resources that will help her welcome this student, assess his needs, and plan an appropriate curriculum.
We'd love to hear more about how it goes with this teacher's progress with her student, and integrating him into the general ESL population.
Best,
Mike Cruse
Disabilities and Equitable Outcomes Moderator
michaelcruse74@gmail.com
Hello,
PANDA-Minnesota Adult Basic Education Disabilities Specialists has a wonderful website with an entire chapter on serving students who are deaf as well as students with various disabilities. Within each chapter are instructional strategies and resources. This website was developed for Adult Basic Education teachers in Minnesota. Here is the link on the chapter about hearing loss and deafness:
http://mn.abedisabilities.org/abe-disability-manual/hearing-loss-and-deafness/overview
Thanks for sharing this site with us, Wendy! It has a lot of great information to support deaf and hard of hearing (HoH) learners. I was also sent this link to course for in the Community Education program, at Community College of Allegheny County (PA), which is for learners who are deaf or HoH. Hopefully these resources will give members some new ideas for working with this population. Please let us know how it goes, and share any other resources that you come across in your work.
Best,
Mike Cruse
Disabilities and Equitable Outcomes Moderator
michaelcruse74@gmail.com
It is possible with truespel phonetics to enable the deaf to SEE how to say words in US dictionary accent. Merely use the converter at http://truespel.com to paste in a paragraph and convert it to truespel phonetics.. The learner need only know how to relate 40 spellings to 40 sounds to be able to read any word in US English accent by reading the phonetics.. the teacher can display slang word pronunciation as well http://www.screenr.com/XOn8 .
Truespel is free with tutorials, converter and much phonetic information on US English on site. It's now being used for speech therapy. It's designed to make phonetics simple enough for children to read and write. This is important for learning reading http://justpaste.it/truequest . Also see video on phoneme frequency at http://bit.ly/2zjUHlt
Thank you, Thomas. I will pass this along to the program / teacher.
Thank you, Michael. I will definitely check this out.
Excellent! Thank you, Wendy. I continue to be impressed with adult education in Minnesota.