Toolkit Idea Topic 17-Sign Language

Hi Everyone. This is the 17th of 27 Idea Topics
I listed on three sheets of paper called:
"A Toolkit Of Ideas for People with A Hearing Loss"
Sheet 1 Introduction Ideas 4 topics
Sheet 2 Toolkit Ideas 18 topics
Sheet 3 Closing Ideas 5 topics

17 SIGN LANGUAGE:
1 Why Study Sign Language?
a Almost 100% OF the people who attend NAD
(Natl Assoc of the Deaf) conventions use
sign language. About 60% of the people who
attend ALDA(Assoc of late deafened Adults)
conventions signand about 30% of the people
who attend HLAA(Hearing Loss Assoc of America)
conventions sign. Plan to attend the SWC
convention in Philadelphia this year to see
how many people sign and use lipreading to
communicate with others.
b A research study showed that only 7% of the
meaning conveyed by by typical utterance regarding
our feelings & attitudescomes from the words we
use, 38% from our voice, and 55% from our body
language. When our body languageconflicts with our
words, we pay more attention to our nonverbal
message.

2 Sign Language: is a language that uses manual
communication, body language and lip patterns
instead of sound t convey meaning-simultaneously
combining hand shapes, orientation and movement
of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions
to express fluidly a speaker's thoughts. Sign
language commonly develops in deaf communities,
which includes interpreters, and friends and
family of deaf people as well as people who are deaf
or hard of hearing themselves.

3 American Sign Language(ASL):is a complex visual-
spacial language that is used by the deaf community
in th US and English-speaking parts of Canada. It is
a linguistically complete, natural language. It is
the native language of many deaf people as well as
some hearing children born into deaf families.
Hand gestures are only one component of ASL.
Facial expressions such as eyebrow movement and
lip-mouth movements are also significant in ASL
as they form a crucial part of the grammatical system

4 Alphabey & Numbers:
a To see the alphabet letters and numbers 0-9 in
black and white type on the internet "american sign
language alhabet". Then click on "american manual
alhabet wikipedia" and print out a copy for your self.
b To see the alphabet letters in color type on the
internet "american sign language fingerspelling",
then click on "American sign language(ASL)" and
print copy for yourself.

5 Fingerspelling:is a way many sign people see a
message. Just as you use 26 letters of the alphabet
to write words on paper, signers use 26 hand-shapes
to show words in front of their body. Each word is
usually spelled letter for letter. It is not hard
to learn. If you and a friend practise these hand-
shapes you can have a two-way conversation. But it
takes a lot of practice to increase spped of finger-
spelling.

6 Learning Signs: Signs are usually learned by
categories or groups such as:
a ategories
1( Clothing
2) Colors
3) Family & Relatives
4) Foods
5) Home
6) People
7) Places we go like restaurants, doctors office
8)Parts oif the body
9) Questions: who what when where & why
10)Time and many more
B Groups:Each group has a specific movement
and all signs in the group basically have
the same movement except for the letter shown.
Example: all in the family group.
1)Sign F for family, A for agency, C for class
To see the sign for family group go towebsite
and type"lifeprint.com", then type family, then
click on "family version b1" to see the sign.

7 References:
a My favorite sign book is "The Joy Of Signing"
by Lottie L reikehof seond edition. It has many
pictures and categories plus an alpabetical
index in the back of the book for each sign.
b Other books can be found on the internet by
typing Sign Language Books.
c A favorite website to learn the alphabet and
finger-spelling is "lifeprint.com"
d Most community colleges and some support
groups offer basic, intermediate and advanced
coursess in sign language. Agood textbook and
experienced teacher are helpful.


Let's exchange ideas on how we learned or can
learn sign language so others can profit from
our experience.



Best regards Paul in New Jersey