Do You Have Stories to Tell Your Experience in Oral Schools?
Would it be nice if someone start collecting numerous testimonials from deaf people who grew up in Oral education? I bet there are many, many “testimonials†comments on Blogs and Vlogs since Deafread.com formed.
Those testimonials are needed to show the world that most oral deaf people did not have a harmony childhood. And that discovered the fulfilled life after learning ASL and thus became a happy bilingual human being.
Email your experience to deafbilingual@gmail.com - redirect to Patricia Raswant. Or type in your blog and say it’s for the testimonials data base with Patricia Raswant.
Here is an example of a testimonial from Wanda
I was born with nerve deafness. At age 5 I was enrolled into Davison School of Speech in Decatur, Georgia. Using hand gestures was forbidden. Whoever got caught using hand gestures got punished. Punishments were severe. Standing in a corner with hands in back for an hour. Turn around, get an extra 30 minutes. There were no second chances. We all became obedient from the headstart.
We hid and used hand gestures. It was scary. This type of life…espionage-styled atmosphere and sneaking around in the name of Freedom became Deaf Children’s well known way of life before the age of 6 and before the age of 10.
We, the Deaf Children of all centuries will always find a way to use hand gestures. The hand gestures we used at Davison School of Speech was not ASL. Students before us invented it and we carried it on.
AG, Volta Bureau and other organizations against ASL and all forms of hand gestures lost the war since Time began.
It is time for these organizations to meld with the DEAF WORLD. Once they meld, wonderful things…………amazing acceleration in education.
I talk Engish. I write English. I sign ASL which has no effect on my English the tinest bit. I am a living proof against any theory claiming a Deaf Person cannot talk if allowed to use ASL.
I can contacted through my e mail address Wandadaxx1@aol.com for exhibition and for speaker engagements. I will talk for everyone to hear my voice and my speech.
Stanford University tested my hearing when I was a small child. The conclusion: Unknown. It is not hereditary.
No one can stop small Deaf Children from inventing hand gestures for the sake of a freedom to use total communications.
To prevent Deaf Children from using hand gestures resulting corporal punishments is a state of totalitarianism in existence in the United States of America. The state of totalitarianism for Deaf Children AND for Deaf Adults has always existed in the United States of America.
It may be more productive to ask these organizations to provide proof that signing does in fact interfere with learning to speak. Has there ever been a study that would show this conclusion? or are they simply relying on the words of people that lived over 100 years ago?
Comment by anon — August 12, 2007 @ 10:35 pm
Clear proof is deaf and HOH people who speak so well and uses ASL. People like that KNOW ASL does not influence the decline of speech. When I was 13, I decided I wanted to go to a state school where all my siblings were. My hearing friends kept telling me not to go because I would lose my ability to speak. I’m like, what? You’re kidding right? They told me, that it was what their parents told them. Nothing but myths. Anyway, every time I came home and hung out with them, they realized I was no worst in speaking.
I think that examples of what we went through and evidence that those who spoke still speak, even with ASL, will speak volumes.
I like the idea of “experience database.” I know there’s going to be LOTS of stories and I myself, will not be surprised to see something that will blow our minds away. I have a few myself, mostly what I’ve witnessed the teachers do to my older siblings.
Comment by C — August 13, 2007 @ 11:34 pm
The #1 comment : To provide proof that signing interferes with learning to speak does not work that way. Helen Keller was born deaf. She learned ASL first before she learned to read, write and speak. Did she write English or ASL? If Helen Keller could not write English “correctly”, did her teacher/assistant convert Helen Keller’s ASL into English on print that made people think Helen Keller wrote Engish?
I was born deaf. I learned to read, write, and speak first before I learned ASL. Before I learned ASL, I already learned hand gestures invented by children before I entered, of Davison School of Speech Correction in the mid 1950s. Davison’s children’s hand gestures are not listed in any known sign language category.
It was created because Deaf children of Davison School were desperate enough to do anything to get full informations they do not recieve from Hearing Authorities and from Hearing Staff from houseparents to teachers.
Information. It’s all about information. Deaf Children have a desire to “know”. They know they are not told everything so they willingly broke the rule and signed, risking punishments, for the freedom of information.
Writing “correctly” according to Hearing Society’s requirement fails to understand and respect Deaf People’s Right to freedom of information in any way they can achieve it.
There are Deaf People who cannot afford exclusive oralism schools. They are looked down by exclusive oralism schools. This created years of conflicts between Deaf People who cannot talk and Hearing People/Deaf People who can talk, avoiding ASL signing Deaf People who cannot talk. This is politics.
Comment by Wanda — August 15, 2007 @ 8:41 am
Being punished for using signs is a common experience for Deaf children.
The methods used were of three types: restrain the hands such as sitting on them, restrain the eyes, such as standing facing into a corner, and deprivation of a favorite activity, such as looking at books or movies.
Notice that all of these involve sensory deprivation which hits Deaf children harder than Hearing children. It also invokes painful emotional reactions in the children that may make them reluctant to participate in education or social activities.
Children restrained in this manner often act out, such as fidgeting, tapping, swinging arms or legs, grimacing and other repetitive motions often seen in children with sensory deprivations or autism. This greatly annoys teachers who think the children are being bad on purpose and again punishes them. Signs may be made to other children to let off steam and woe be to the ones that are caught at it again.
All Deaf people remember these annoyed teachers and their memorable blowups in the classroom. Perhaps describing these teachers would give enlightenment to why so many Deaf are angry at audists today.
Comment by Dianrez — August 26, 2007 @ 11:15 pm