for those students who are majoring in special ed deaf/ H/H, based on my observations thanks this course for opening my eyes on many areas!

I have been attending to various deaf social events mainly to socialize with other deaf individuals from different backgrounds.  Any networking event where deaf people convene, has implications on deaf individuals:  It promotes greater awareness of deaf people from different walks of life and allows for exchange of their struggles and frustrations, which in turn, creates a positive environment where they acknowledge each other’s existence and find common ground which they first thought would only happen in their dreams.  My deaf twin brother and I naturally developed our own sign languages since our parents received information from “well-established” oral-oriented institutions making handsome profits by manipulating hearing parents of a deaf child that to be able to speak orally would elevate our “status” and to prepare us to become “career-oriented” in the real world.  Thus to be able to speak orally means we are not primitive.  I was suddenly very much aware of what it meant to be a minority in a pre-dominantly hearing school and community.   That kind of attitude has become a norm and it has become a subconscious one in each one of us.  There were some events that have had a lasting impact on my personal growth, especially about how to work with deaf and hard of hearing students with ADHD.  These students get distracted easily and have a difficult time learning since they did not receive proper services/resources available which would enable them to thrive in a learning environment regardless of their deafness.  

I will never forget how I felt on the day I missed a lab assignment my high school chemistry teacher assigned me. It was a two-page report on a video I had watched. To my dismay, that video did not contain closed captions, and my interpreter had to translate the video.  I was furious knowing that there are videos that do contain closed captions and my teacher chose one without any and did not show any understanding about my deafness.  This is one example of a wide variety of levels of discrimination I have experienced since I was a young boy.  I finally understand that I must pursue my own path to educate hearing people about how to better accommodate deaf people’s needs for communicative accessibility. 

 

From my experiences working at the camps, schools, and at other events, I have observed a pattern, that is: deaf and hard of hearing students with ADHD are able to learn just like other peers.  From my newly found interest, I’ve become intrigued by them to the point that I would like to focus special attention to that field, providing right services/resources to those deaf kids with ADHD.   Since my childhood, I have detected in myself a certain compassion on innate desire to help other deaf students who are largely disadvantaged and face discrimination unconsciously on a daily basis. 

Every time I had conversations with these kids, I used American Sign Language and it easily transformed into a story, full of facial expressions, 3-D effects, and other special effects came in picture (ASL has this capability).  If I signed plainly, did not incorporate facial expressions, or if movements of my hands were “limited”, these kids would have been more likely to ignore me and go back to their regular routines.  So whenever I expressed ASL artfully, the kids found me very fascinating and their eyes were totally focused on me as my stories unfolded.  They then started to learn on their own and played around with different ways of how to express themselves through sign language.   The result was astonishing, they started to learn some classifiers in which later contributed them to be able to express openly in morphological and grammatical structures.   These kids looked at me as an influential person who understands their sufferings and frustrations.  Some would come to me and say that I’m an inspiring person and without my guidance and wisdom, they would still be in the shadows of this society.  I have to teach them to be proud of themselves and remind them that they are ambassadors to the hearing world.   Through education, they would eventually come to appreciate others without allowing their handicapped status to conquer their “free thinking”.   It has always been important to me to help younger deaf students achieve in their education.  This begins with promoting self-esteem among deaf students as they experience continued obstacles and it is my goal to encourage them to be proud of their deafness and view themselves as valued members of our society.