How to Teach Deaf Students to Read?

The ultimate authorities in reading to deaf children are deaf adults. Comparative studies of deaf children with hearing parents and deaf children with deaf parents show that deaf children with deaf parents are superior in academic achievement, reading and writing, and social development (Ewoldt, Hoffmeister, & Israelite, 1992). Hearing parents and teachers can learn from the read aloud strategies used by deaf parents. The following 15 principles have been identified based on research that examined deaf parents and deaf teachers reading to deaf children.
Instructions

1. Learn American Sign Language (ASL). To teach a deaf learner how to read, you must be able to speak with him. At first, you may find yourself relying on general gestures, pointing and comparison of objects (for example, a lemon, an apple and a pear). Your student needs to know that you care and are serious about communicating with him.
2. Identify the differences in hearing and deaf learners. Hearing students usually learn to read through a combination of auditory and visual cues. Deaf students, on the other hand, learn to read through primarily visual means: words with pictures, physical movement and facial expressions. Use each of these to convey meaning and help a deaf student understand patterns in written English.
3. Identify the differences in language structure between written English and ASL. Written English is the second language of the deaf. The verb and adverb structure is complex and difficult to learn–radically different from the more concise structure of ASL. Signed sentences are typically made up of nouns strung together and heightened by vivid facial expressions. For example, “You are so kind!” in written English may become “You kind!” with an appropriate smile in ASL.
4. Teach the basics. Write single letters, using finger-spelling and ABC charts or books with pictures to help the student recognize written letters. This will be rote memorization, but it is an important step.
5. Focus on nouns and even adjectives using pictures and objects. Help your student identify a picture or object using ASL, then finger-spelling, then writing. Encourage her to compose simple, short words stringing letters together (cat, sad, mom).
6. Arrange a series of pictures to show a complete but simple sentence. As the deaf student advances, mix up the pictures and have him arrange them into a coherent form. For example, “Dog to ran the park the” could become, “The dog ran to the park.”
7. Compose. Ask your student to create her own sentences. These can be creative or teacher-led. Determining that a student has internal acquisition of written English is an important step in teaching a deaf learner how to read.