Are oral dhh folks hypocrites?

Oh and V....I agree 100%...unfortunatly most oral sucesses are the result of relatively rich families who have access to wicked good speech therapists!
 
"What is all the fuss about?"

I am with you... I'm so sick of people using divisive tactics that do nothing but hurt kids. There's nothing wrong with signing, and there's nothing wrong with talking. There's nothing wrong with using ASL, PSE, fm system, speech therapy, phonics. How many people withold from kids because they're against the other guys. I'm just so tired of it.
 
If anything i see ASL as something that opens a door. I grew up speaking (coz my hearing probably wasn't noticed till i was 15) and learning ASL is tremendous thing to have. If anything i think it HELPS. I don't know why people see ASL as this horrible awful thing. really...
 
life

i grew up deaf ,but just learned sign in the past 2 years...and now i am so happy i could puke!!!!! :barf: i now have lots of deaf freinds.. and i can now have a 15 person conversation! :dance2: :locked:
 
PrincessTabu said:
"What is all the fuss about?"

I am with you... I'm so sick of people using divisive tactics that do nothing but hurt kids. There's nothing wrong with signing, and there's nothing wrong with talking. There's nothing wrong with using ASL, PSE, fm system, speech therapy, phonics. How many people withold from kids because they're against the other guys. I'm just so tired of it.
Click to expand...

Agreed, I don't get it...why is it so bad to give kids a whole "toolkit" to choose from?

As a hearing person, I intend to teach my children both of the languages that I know (English/Spanish), for the very same reason...the more different ways in which you can communicate, the better. But one is not "better" than the other.
 
why is it so bad to give kids a whole "toolkit" to choose from?
Click to expand...
Because (sarcasm) Accepting Sign and other alternative communications or other disabled accomondations like wheelchairs/crutches/ special ed....is admitting that they are DISABLED AND HANDICAPPED AND CWIPPLED. The only thing that should matter is making them function like psuedo nondisabled people, b/c disabilty is just SO BAD! It's better to pretend that everything's healthy and normal! No disabled accomondations are good enough....the only thing that matters is functioning like a nondisabled person (/end sarcasm)
 
That about explains the anti-ASL people, from what I've seen. But what about those who oppose speech as a possible tool for students to have in addition to ASL? Why is that not seen as at least a "fallback" method for when accomodations are inadequate or unavailable?

Sorry if that's a stupid question. :(
 
But what about those who oppose speech as a possible tool for students to have in addition to ASL? Why is that not seen as at least a "fallback" method for when accomodations are inadequate or unavailable?
Click to expand...
Well VERY few deafies are anti-speech per se. SOME are.....SOME are....and it's understandable.....Learning to speak is VERY boring, and VERY tedious. It's really really frustrating.....and no guarentee of sucess.
 
deafdyke said:
Well VERY few deafies are anti-speech per se. SOME are.....SOME are....and it's understandable.....Learning to speak is VERY boring, and VERY tedious. It's really really frustrating.....and no guarentee of sucess.
Click to expand...

Not true. It's equally limiting from both sides. And learning to speak is difficult for some, for some it is EASIER than signing. It's not just about learning to speak either, it's about using residual hearing to learn english grammar, to obtain information. People are different and should be respected for who they are, not for who some group thinks they should be.
 
Rose Immortal said:
That about explains the anti-ASL people, from what I've seen. But what about those who oppose speech as a possible tool for students to have in addition to ASL? Why is that not seen as at least a "fallback" method for when accomodations are inadequate or unavailable?

Sorry if that's a stupid question. :(
Click to expand...

Rose, that's not a stupid question at all. The literacy rates of deaf children continue to level off at 3-4 grade. There's really no place for egos in this. I'm sorry if I'm coming across strongly to people, but attitudes have got to change on both sides. There is no right and wrong, it has to focus on what works for a child.
 
What is more important to me is that all people have to make allowances for each other! We're all on the same side, aren't we?
 
Not true. It's equally limiting from both sides. And learning to speak is difficult for some, for some it is EASIER than signing. It's not just about learning to speak either, it's about using residual hearing to learn english grammar, to obtain information. People are different and should be respected for who they are, not for who some group thinks they should be.
Click to expand...
Princess Tabu, I'm VERY pro dhh kids (especially hoh kids) being raised bilingally.
I'm just putting out some reasons why a Deaf advocate might hold an ASL-only with no speech therapy view. And actually it is a fact that there's a VERY high rate of apraxia (a language production disorder) among deaf and hard of hearing kids. Like a kid can have really poor residual hearing, but learn to speak anyway. Curtis Pride only had 5% of hearing aided, and he was an oral sucess. And even many oral sucesses still have significent language production issues. Like they say "How many spiders have legs?" instead of "How many legs do spiders have?" or they may have lower verbal IQs then their hearing peers.
While I don't agree with going ASL/Sign only, I can understand the mentality....Some dhh kids have a nautral flair for speech and have dumped Sign on their OWN! There's NOTHING wrong with that! But for those who don't have a flair for oral skills, a speech therapy session or being raised oral-only may be akin to life as an eternal speech therapy session or like a real life Pygmalion session (eg the Rain In Spain Falls Mainly on the Plain)
 
and Princess Tabu..... speech therapy IS frustrating and boring once you get past language therapy. Don't you think going "boo-be-bah?" for hours for articualtion practice is boring and tedious? I mean I definitly think that most dhh kids should learn to speak just as a tool......but once you get past the language therapy, (which can be kind of fun) forcing a dhh kid to depend exclusively on speech and hearing is like forcing a kid who's mostly mobile with a walker to walk EVERY where, without considering the possibilty that alternative options can help them. (eg a wheelchair for long distances or hard terrain or whatever)
Yes, some kids can learn to speak easier then they can sign. I was one of those kids, as I have poor fine motor skills.....BUT, the end goal of EVERY dhh kid's IEP/educational outcome,should be fluency in both ASL and speech. There's just no way that one single way is going to be sufficent for ALL methods. Make sense?
 
I grew up oral and with that same attitude of not needing sign language and that I am better off being able to speak and communicate with hearing people. As a result, I looked down on so many deaf people who used ASL even my brother. It hurted our relationship and now I am the one with the HUGE regrets for being such a hypocrate growing up.


Like many of u said, ASL opened so many doors for me. :)
 
Umm.. As someone who was thrown into the whole oral thingie about 4 months after contacting spinal mengetisis and becoming deaf, I have to say there are hypocrites. I was one at age 4. because I Stubbornly refused to admit I was deaf... and I told my mom I could hear by reading her lips and watching facial expressions.

Thank god I grew out of it.. Just wanted to share that. And no, I wasn't learning sign language at the time.. I didn't start learning til I was 6 years old.
 
BearBeauty said:
Umm.. As someone who was thrown into the whole oral thingie about 4 months after contacting spinal mengetisis and becoming deaf, I have to say there are hypocrites. I was one at age 4. because I Stubbornly refused to admit I was deaf... and I told my mom I could hear by reading her lips and watching facial expressions.

Thank god I grew out of it.. Just wanted to share that. And no, I wasn't learning sign language at the time.. I didn't start learning til I was 6 years old.
Click to expand...

I believed that I was hearing until around 24 years old...can u imagine that? I was in deep deep denial about my deafness. Honestly, I wish I know what put that idea in my head and let it grow to the point where it consumed me. :ugh3:
 
deafdyke said:
and Princess Tabu..... speech therapy IS frustrating and boring once you get past language therapy. Don't you think going "boo-be-bah?" for hours for articualtion practice is boring and tedious? I mean I definitly think that most dhh kids should learn to speak just as a tool......but once you get past the language therapy, (which can be kind of fun) forcing a dhh kid to depend exclusively on speech and hearing is like forcing a kid who's mostly mobile with a walker to walk EVERY where, without considering the possibilty that alternative options can help them. (eg a wheelchair for long distances or hard terrain or whatever)
Yes, some kids can learn to speak easier then they can sign. I was one of those kids, as I have poor fine motor skills.....BUT, the end goal of EVERY dhh kid's IEP/educational outcome,should be fluency in both ASL and speech. There's just no way that one single way is going to be sufficent for ALL methods. Make sense?
Click to expand...


I remember that even in middle school, I was doing drills of saying the letter "x" ....this is what I did "X, X, X , X , X, X, X...I had to keep on going until I perfected it. Well, guess what? The next day, my speech therapist tested to see if I could still say that letter correctly and if I didnt it was back to square one again. My speech therapist had the worst stinky bad breath ever! She seemed so high strung and would get frustrated easily if I messed up on my pronouncions. It was no fun but I had to go cuz it was on my IEP and by the law. :ugh3:
 
I am hoh and people tell me that I have a slight impediment and sometimes I come across as unintelligible even though they know good and well that I have an above average IQ. (not that it matters here). Even in elementary when we had those read aloud sessions I was known for running all of my words together and it came out something like this:

thedogranoutthedoorandjanecalledhimbackthedogreturnedtothedoortheeend.

It wasnt because I was not understanding what people were saying, it was because thats how I heard it. And even now as an adult if I hear something spoken, I am likely to repeat it in the exact pattern it was spoken, and this alone freaks some people out.

I know my speech is not perfect nor will it ever be, but because I am able to speak well enough to be understood without much effort, most people put up with it.

I plan on learning ASL and I hope to get to the point that I can switch back and forth between speech and ASL (and anything else I may need to learn) that I can get important details and information that I may otherwise miss.

I think ASL and speech should go hand in hand. They both compliment each other in their own ways.
 
Dixie said:
I am hoh and people tell me that I have a slight impediment and sometimes I come across as unintelligible even though they know good and well that I have an above average IQ. (not that it matters here). Even in elementary when we had those read aloud sessions I was known for running all of my words together and it came out something like this:

thedogranoutthedoorandjanecalledhimbackthedogreturnedtothedoortheeend.

It wasnt because I was not understanding what people were saying, it was because thats how I heard it. And even now as an adult if I hear something spoken, I am likely to repeat it in the exact pattern it was spoken, and this alone freaks some people out.

I know my speech is not perfect nor will it ever be, but because I am able to speak well enough to be understood without much effort, most people put up with it.

I plan on learning ASL and I hope to get to the point that I can switch back and forth between speech and ASL (and anything else I may need to learn) that I can get important details and information that I may otherwise miss.

I think ASL and speech should go hand in hand. They both compliment each other in their own ways.
Click to expand...

:lol: That cracked me up! This is what speech sounds to me:

buh dodol eepp ruitth uuupppaaa

just a serious of vowels sounds...sometimes I can catch a "H" or "G" here and there...

I am surprised that I dont talk the same way how I hear speech. Kinda amazing isnt it? My brother DOES talk how he hears speech which is why nobody can understand his speech.
 
Back
Top