EARLY HEARING DETECTION AND INTERVENTION VIRTUAL CONFERENCE
MARCH 2-5, 2021
(Virtually the same conference, without elevators, airplane tickets, or hotel room keys)
Stuck at beginner level: Hearing parents' challenges in learning ASL word order
Hearing parents who choose to sign with their DHH child offer an accessible language and inclusive home environment. Unfortunately, frustrating obstacles often block parents from achieving ASL proficiency. In particular, parental ASL instruction focuses disproportionately on vocabulary, neglecting the word order rules necessary for combining vocabulary into grammatical ASL sentences. This pattern emerged in our survey of 23 hearing parents of DHH children between 0;07 and 9;11 years (median 4;0 years) who shared their experiences as new sign language learners. Asked what aspect(s) of sign language posed the most difficulty for them, parents overwhelmingly characterized sign language "Word order" as Quite Difficult (20/23) or Near Impossible (1/20) to learn, followed closely by "Classifiers" (18/23 Quite Difficult). Word order is notably more variable in ASL than in English, often a result of complex interactions with classifier constructions. In follow-up interviews, parents described word order as a "big stumbling block" and "huge challenge," revealing three recurring themes:
1. Parents feel their lack of ASL word order knowledge keenly and are uneasy about using English word order with ASL signs.
2. Attempts to solicit word order instruction or correction are frustratingly unsuccessful.
3. Deaf adults often refrain from correcting parents' ASL word order to avoid discouraging them and/or modify their own ASL to more English-like word order to accommodate beginner-signer parents.
As one mother lamented after 1.5 years of ASL instruction, "I have hit this wall, like all the vocabulary has been very helpful but now...I [need] to get really serious in practicing the word order [but I’m not] finding a place to do that or to get that." Addressing this critical gap in parents' ASL learning requires partnerships between sign linguists and early interventionists to translate the latest word order research into family-centered pedagogy to support hearing parents' ASL development beyond beginner level.
- Recognize the aspects of learning ASL that hearing parents report as most difficult to learn.
- Identify reasons why word order might be particularly difficult for hearing parents.
- Demonstrate how collaboration between sign language linguists and early interventionists can lead to family-ASL curricula that incorporate more updated and robust information on ASL syntax.
Poster:
23278_13587DeborahChen Pichler.pdf
Presenter: Deborah Chen Pichler
Deborah Chen Pichler is Professor of Linguistics at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC. Her research focuses on the acquisition of ASL by Deaf children, bimodal bilingual acquisition of ASL and English by Coda children and Deaf children with cochlear implants from Deaf families. She also studies L2 acquisition of ASL by hearing and Deaf adults, particularly hearing parents of deaf and hard of hearing children.
ASHA DISCLOSURE:
Financial -
No relevant financial relationship exist.
Nonfinancial -
No relevant nonfinancial relationship exist.
Diane Lillo-Martin is a Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Linguistics at the University of Connecticut. Her main research interest is to better understand the human language faculty. Primarily she examines this by studying the structure and acquisition of American Sign Language, and by looking at the process of language acquisition across different languages. See her site for the Sign Linguistics and Language Acquisition lab (http://slla.lab.uconn.edu/) for more information.
ASHA DISCLOSURE:
Financial -
Nonfinancial -
Elaine Gale is an associate professor and program leader of the deaf and hard of hearing teacher preparation program at Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY). She is currently the chair of the Deaf Leadership International Alliance (DLIA), an organization established to advocate deaf adults collaborating with professionals and connecting with young deaf children and their families. Her research experiences include joint attention, theory of mind, and sign language development. At present, she is the Lead Investigator for the Hunter College consortium on a research project titled Family ASL: Bimodal Bilingual Acquisition by Deaf Children of Hearing Parents supported by the National Institute on Deafness and other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
ASHA DISCLOSURE:
Financial -
No relevant financial relationship exist.
Nonfinancial -
No relevant nonfinancial relationship exist.