New Website for Parents of Deaf Children
A new website for parents of Deaf Children and parents that want their hearing babies to learn sign language.
And also for hearing students taking ASL courses, Deaf Culture, Deaf studies and language at Universities, colleges, high schools and sign classes.
Some people will wonder why I have some words as hearing impaired. Those are keywords to catch surfers. Please do not feel offended. It is very important that we educate the public about the main theme of the good side in Deaf Culture.
If you have any hearing parents/friends that would like to learn more about signing, etc, this is another one to look at.
Thank you,
John F. Egbert
Posted on April 25th, 2007 by egbertpress
Filed under: Uncategorized
Excellent - look forward to the growth of this site! Thank you John!
Glad you found this site. I look forward to checking it out further. Thanks for sharing.
~ LaRonda
A great site, but perhaps a “Message in a Bottle” in a Sea of Audistic MISINFORMATION. Would that it were so; that Hearing Parents of the Deaf would look to other Deaf of Hearing for advice on how to be Deaf in a Hearing World. These people HAVE BEEN through what your child is going to go through! WHY WON’T YOU LISTEN TO THEM????
Instead, they rely on Educators and Doctors who are Hearing who tend to perpetuate the long disproven MYTHS. 1) Learning Sign will impede learning English. 2) Signers will be forever TRAPPED in the Deaf Community and unable to function in society.
To make your site better, I think you need to EXPLODE these two MYTHS FOREVER!!! With the FACTS that are already out there.
1) Learning Sign will impede learning English.
Utterly wrong. Evidence overwhelmingly shows that learning mulitple languages at an early age GREATLY improves language learning ability. Not just Baby Sign shows this, but there are parents of Hearing children who sign their children up for language courses as early as possible. There are Chinese language Kindergartens that are swelling with Native English speaking children.
My own nephew went to Kindergarten in Austria, even though he and his parents hardly knew a word of German. Weren’t they WORRIED about him LOSING his English, being placed among a group of German-speaking kids? Not at all! They expected him picking up German to ENHANCE his language skills. And, boy how, did it EVER.
2) Signers will be forever TRAPPED in the Deaf Community and unable to function in society.
I think Tom Westman, winner of Survivor 10: Palau, dealing with his own Deaf daughter, Meghan, encapsulates a lot of Hearing Parents of Deaf: “Our early research into deafness was not encouraging. While there is a robust Deaf community with its own language and culture, it was not our world, and we would be strangers in hers.”
http://www.tom108.com/content3.html
WHY??? Why is learning ASL such an insurmountible obstacle? As opposed to the surgery and years of therapy he chose for Meghan? Why not even TRY to meet her half way?
Westman clearly wanted to give his daughter the greatest access to the Hearing World. Why not give her the greatest access to BOTH WORLDS???
Giving (as a Hearing Parent of a Deaf Child) exposure to ASL and Deaf Culture gives them an even greater GIFT to them than any surgery or therapy ever could. It gives them access to a COMMUNITY of hundreds of THOUSANDS that have gone through many of the experiences your Deaf child will face. They will act as a SUPPORT GROUP to help your Deaf child face every problem in life.
DENYING your child of this GIFT is, in my opinion, the WORST thing you can do to your child.
Ken Rose,
This website has 30 pages and have more content pages coming, maybe up to 100 pages with many different informations similar to your concerns.
Not only me being a gospel, you and many others can do gospels in positive appoach to the public, a win-win situation for us and hearing parents which will enhance the chances for all deaf children into bilingual education.
John F. Egbert
John F. Egbert
Hi John,
It can serve as a resourceful page for hearing parents but a little revision needs to be made if you will. I imagine the time and effort you have put in and that is a great accomplishment. Kudos to you..but please allow me to share my feedback.
When I gleefully click on Deaf Children and Signing, the first thing it led me to this page titled Deafness and Hearing Loss. Isn’t it possible to focus on the culture and the language of deaf people first? I just feel that the first focus is on the ear and that is what it’s significant to them. It does not necessarily have to be this way.
Also when this page talks about using terms deafness, impairment, or any common pathological terms, can you re-consider by replacing deafness to deafhood (when applicable), impairment to just deaf and so on to make the labels more positive and less pathological. We just got to avoid to misuse these terms that are no longer considered acceptable to the deaf community such as hearing impaired and hearing disabilities or whatsoever.
As for the Hearing Deafness page, I noticed that you suggested cued speech along with sign language and fingerspelling. I am wondering why didn’t you mention ASL? I just have mixed feelings reading this page.
When I read this:
“it’s also important that support services be available to parents who are trying to cope with a child’s auditory disability”….
again it sounded negative like oh an auditory disability! Just simply say……
it’s also important that support services be available to parents who are trying to cope with a deaf child…
You know hearing parents reading this coming from you as a model making them thinking it is okay to use these terms. I just feel that we need to make the message clearer but letting them know what kind of label or description that the deaf community generally accepts and not accept. All I am asking is to remove what are considered negative terms and also the true definition of the deaf applies to all of individuals regardless of their degree of hearing loss.
Also please reclaim US Sign Language as one of the links to American Sign Language. The last thing I want to do is to confuse parents or anyone since we don’t normally label US Sign Language.
This statement bothers me big time:
“With the help of such devices, you may be able to understand words and sounds to such an extent that you no longer consider yourself to be deaf.” I am like what? no way! I wear hearing aid but that doesn’t mean I no longer consider myself to be deaf. This is an understatement and must be removed period.
As for cochlear implant children, you had provided the benefits. But what I would like to see for deaf children who are immersed in ASL/English environment have shown success in academic progress. My two deaf children are that. I feel that these kind of deaf children are not in the spotlight enough that the parents can see that they also have literacy skills.
I know it is important to promote your book, but the blue box in the middle of every page is annoying. Try considering an icon of your book on the side.
Now on a positive note, I really like the links you had included in the deaf education page.
I just hope you understand my intention about what I just said and it is to give you a feedback. I just applaud you for your hard work. Keep it up!
Barb,
I understand everything you said and wrote you an email explaining why I had no choice because of the keywords that optimized my website to attract everybody that surfs the net.
Yes, I will downsize that annoying box. Thanks for your input. I will be building the website with more content pages of information as I go along.
John