Feedback Needed for ASL Course

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MelMoore

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Hi there!

I am a member of the ASL team at Mango Languages and we are currently working on creating an ASL course.

We want to create something new, exciting, and unlike any ASL course currently out there. We've already shared our website with a few other members of the Deaf community, who were rather disappointed with our course. This is definitely understandable, because a native speaker is not teaching the course prototype. We were trying to get a prototype done quickly and affordably. Unfortunately, this did cause us to sacrifice some quality and accuracy from the lesson. We have not released this to the public yet, rather, we are seeking feedback on the mechanics of the course in terms of the design and the built-in assessment features.

Based on your feedback, we will develop a course that revolutionizes the way ASL is taught. We want to use a native speaker of ASL, as we not only want to teach the language, but also educate our learners on the community and culture that it stems from. We would love to hear your feedback about what we could do to improve. You can check out the interactive video prototype on our website, which can be found here.

Feel free to reply to this thread or comment through the feedback system found at the bottom of our website.

Thank you so much!

Melanie
Marketing Intern at Mango Languages
 
So this is a for profit endeavor by a group of hearing people?
 
Bottesini said:
So this is a for profit endeavor by a group of hearing people?
Click to expand...

Hi Bottesini,

Thank you for your reply!

At the end of the day, Mango Languages is a for profit company.

Our goal is to enrich lives with language learning. Therefore, we mainly sell our program to libraries and schools, so that people who may not be able to access foreign language courses can enrich their lives with language learning. :)

We are not seeking profit by posting to this forum. We are seeking feedback on how to best educate the general public about ASL and its community. Based on your comment, what would you recommend?
 
from above - ".... We are seeking feedback on how to best educate the general public about ASL and its community...."


education not by Hearing people-

but by Deaf people
 
MelMoore said:
. . . how to best educate the general public about ASL and its community….
Click to expand...
Put a Deaf person, native ASL user who is active in the Deaf community, in charge of the program. Pay Deaf people to educate the general public, and to develop the program. That would be a good start.
 
dogmom said:
education not by Hearing people-

but by Deaf people
Click to expand...
Reba said:
Put a Deaf person, native ASL user who is active in the Deaf community, in charge of the program. Pay Deaf people to educate the general public, and to develop the program. That would be a good start.
Click to expand...

Hi dogmom and Reba!

Thank you for your feedback and encouragement about hiring more members of the Deaf community to work on Mango's ASL course. We're definitely planning on using a native ASL speaker, moving forward.

The reason why this wasn't the case initially is that we were creating something and throwing it out there to simply get started. That's always the hardest part for many organizations.

What we'd like to know now is, what would make Mango's efforts something that you would see as a real solution to the gripes and concerns encountered teaching and learning ASL through other means?

We are a technology focused organization that simply wants to see if we can address the more difficult issues involved in learning and teaching ASL. However, we're still in the process of identifying those problems. That's really why we want to reach out.

If you were to use something that we created, what would make you think, 'These guys got it.'?

I hope that somewhat clarifies what angle we're coming from, we definitely don't mean to intrude in any way, we just wanted to make sure we get some insight before we keep pushing forward with something that isn't effective at all.
 
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