How do you teach a Deaf student to read?
According to my Teaching Reading class, phonics is very important for teaching students to read. A large part of the class focused on the importance of students understanding that words were a combination of letters, which represented sounds.
As a future special education teacher, it is possible that I will be responsible for teaching students who are Deaf or Hearing Impaired to read. I am just wondering how the process would differ for this population, as they are unable to hear the phonetic link. Clearly they are capable of learning, but how would a teacher best facilitate this skill?
Thank you for your time.
Just like the IEP's you will be writing, reading is based on what the individual child needs. You will have kids who have very good visual memory,and some may have enough residual hearing or cochlear implants which allow them to to develop phonetics.
Of course you will have parents with specific preference to oral-deaf or ASL -Deaf..either way, you will need their support!
With profoundly Deaf children I have taught "word families" which are spelled the same way but not pronounced the same way so they could learn visually. It seemed to help a little on standardized tests which always seem to have a component of sound/symbol tasks.
This year I have a profoundly Deaf parent request her son learn the symbol and speechreading, as he had never had any speech teaching. I use some of the cochlear implant booksvideos and lip-reading books.
As for my kids with some hearing I teach basic phonics with pictures for the sound symbol part. I must say I go through4 to 5 consumables per grade level. I like to work best with picture phonics. Say there are three pictures and two need to "match" the vowel. Then I like to say the words myself and have them tell me which two match rather than set them off to do the work themselves. They need to HEAR a clear model.
Don't count on your speech pathologist to know how to deal with either the D/HH child.(there are obviously some smart SLP's on THIS site.. but not always in every school)!!!
When I was in a Deaf school, the best reading I saw came out of the Deaf teachers who transfered back and forth from ASL to English for comprehension. Explaining and reexplaining and creating visual imagry..always seeing if the child is "getting" it.
I have had some mentally challenged D/HH kids and used agumentative communication devices and the Mayer-Johnson symbols where you can type out words and the icon will print right on top. Check out their material as it will be just esencial for all you special ed kids. Bravo for you thinking ahead!!!
Breaking the Sound Barrier - Deaf and Hearing Impaired Art Exhibition
