Debbie Golos

ABSTRACT Teachers of deaf children express concern over a lack of curricular materials appropriate for and beneficial to the deaf population, particularly for language and literacy development and in early childhood classrooms. In addition, more and more deaf children are attending classrooms in which their teachers may not be fluent in ASL. This, too, indicates a need for curricular resources that support and extend language and literacy instruction for deaf children. The current study examines the potential of classroom activities designed to supplement an educational video series in ASL. The participants included one teacher, six deaf children, and one child of a Deaf adult (Coda) in an early childhood classroom. Over the course of two weeks, the teacher showed the participants an educational video and implemented six supplemental activities, all of which were designed to promote a set of early literacy skills (e.g., vocabulary, knowledge of story elements, sequencing ability). Each activity was video-recorded and transcribed for children’s displays of literacy-related behaviors. The teacher also filled out a survey in order to provide feedback on the usability and effectiveness of the activities. The findings suggest that the children displayed many of the targeted skills during the classroom activities, and the descriptive statistics show higher mean scores in targeted skills following the classroom activities. Although they are exploratory, these findings suggest the potential benefit of incorporating such activities into early childhood classrooms.

ABSTRACT Early childhood educators need access to research-based practices and materials to help all children learn to read. Some theorists have suggested that individuals learn to read through “dual coding” (i.e., a verbal code and a nonverbal code) and may benefit from more than one route to literacy (e.g., dual coding theory). Although deaf children can successfully learn to read through American Sign Language (ASL) without sound, few have examined the contributions of sign language as a potential mode, within the verbal code, for hearing children. The purpose of the current investigation was to examine the effects of an educational video that utilizes ASL, in addition to other verbal and nonverbal content, on hearing preschoolers’ early ASL and literacy skills. Participants (N = 77) were randomly assigned to one of three groups: some viewed the video in ASL with sound; some viewed in ASL and without sound; and others did not view the video. Targeted ASL and early literacy skills were assessed before and after viewing. Statistical analyses determined whether scores changed from pretest to posttest, and results showed significant gains for children who viewed a combination of sound and ASL. Although gains were not found on the standardized measure of print and word awareness skills, the results suggest that young hearing children learned the content and skills that were explicitly taught in a video that utilized ASL, fingerspelling and print along with sound. Such results suggest that a visual language, ASL, may serve as an alternative route to literacy development. Early Childhood Education Journal Early Childhood Education Journal Look Inside Other actions Export citation Register for Journal Updates About This Journal Reprints and Permissions Add to Papers Share Share this content on Facebook Share this content on Twitter Share this content on LinkedIn

: There is increasing support for using media products as early intervention tools for deaf children. Because deaf children are visual learners, products such as interactive DVDs and videos can be an effective supplement in the teaching of ASL and literacy skills to deaf children. While adult mediation during literacy activities has been shown to have a positive impact on