Fingerspelling Practice?

justinram11 said:
One more question if I could. :) I understand in ASL that you always put the "wh" word at the end, so like "Where are you going?" would be "You going where?". My question is, can you do this with non-question sentences?

Such as:
"I know very little sign language"
"Sign language I know very little"

Would the second be more correct than the first? or would they both be acceptable?

:ty:!!!!!
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"Sign language, me?" (Rhetorical yes-no eyebrows) "Little." (On your face you would emphasize that it is very little.)
 
Ive been signing for a couple years now and I fingerspell a lot when I sign. I still get confused. My friends get what im saying but if im talking to someone who isnt used to my signing I have to slow it down. I practice all the time still. In the shower I will fingerspell all the words on the back of the shampoo bottle, things like that. And paying attention to what letter combinations give me a hard time. For some reason M-I-L-K is way hard for me! I also throw in the letter Y in all sorts of places it doesnt belong!

If you need help learningt o read fingerspelling, ive spent a lot of time here: http://www.aslpro.com/cgi-bin/aslpro/fingerspell.cgi
 
The best tip for practicing fingerspelling is what Reba gave. Practice letter combinations. But let me expand on this a bit. Try a letter combination of one word. Just keep practicing this combination until it feels comfortable, smooth, and most importantly - easy for you to recognize. After you have reached this point, add another letter to your combination until you are once again smooth, comfortable, and easy for you to recognize. Keep adding letters until you have completed a word. One example of this is the word "state". All these letters are easy to mess up when learning to fingerspell, so this word could help you with your fingerspelling.

Here's a tip on reading fingerspelling. Don't sweat not seeing all the letters of the word. Try and read the word and determine what the word could be from the letters you see. Let me give an example. If you see someone sign the following. "work...work....work. i hate j-b." You could pretty much guess that the word being spelled at the end would be "job". So the morale of the story here, don't tense up. Try to relax and go with the flow.

Just another thought. Find a fellow student to help practice spelling and reading. This way, both of you can practice spelling and reading. Let's face it, being able to read fingerspelling is probably a bit more important than being able to fingerspelling quickly.

On a side note, something which I always find cute with fingerspelling. Often when one sees someone rapidly fingerspelling the word "chili" - it will sometimes look like "CH <I love you>" :lol:
 
One thing I do a lot is practice fingerspelling while driving. (Yikes! lol) As mentioned before, practice fingerspelling street signs, billboards, everything you see, or just even a word or two from the signs.

Say the WORD as you fingerspell it (even if it's slowly), but DON'T say/think the individual letters. (I'm still working on THAT one. lol)

Also, don't bounce your hand when fingerspelling. Try to keep your hand relatively still so the spelling looks smoother. Also you don't need to overdo each letter. By that I mean that letters can blend just a bit from one to the other. But I guess that will come with practice too. : )

And as said before... go slow! Get the production of the letters down first, THEN slowly work on getting faster at it. Remember, no matter how fast or slow you fingerspell, if it's not clear, no one will understand what your trying to say!

Good Luck! : )
 
Just wanted to update that your suggestions are awesome!

What I did is, I read alot, and so about every ten minutes I would fingerspell a paragraph. It was slow going at first (I made myself take it slow), but now after just 5 days of practicing, I'm tons better!! Quick question if I may, we were trying to sign unicorn (don't ask why xD) and so I stuck my pointer finger out and made a sort of "closed D" shape on the top middle of your forehead. She said never to sign it again!! Lol, what does it mean?? She wouldn't tell us
 
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Ohh, I remember learning fingerspelling. :)

The suggestion given about fingerspelling is great! One thing about your pinky cramping is just to try not to do overkill when you're practicing. If you fingerspell continuously for a while, your whole hand will cramp up.

Once I was more comfortable with the spelling, I'd play a game at the stoplights with myself. I probably looked crazy to other drivers, but whatever. When you stop at a red light, try to fingerspell the names of the street you're at, any signs you see, car brand names, etc. before the light turns green. If I mispelled something, I'd try to beat the light and spell it again correctly. Obviously don't do this when you're actually driving, just do it at a stop light or when you're parked somewhere waiting. :)

Anytime I was just standing around waiting to order my food at restaurant or whatever, I'd try to spell the name of the restaurant, menu items, whatever you can.

After a while, you'll get the hang of it. To improve your receptive skills, just watch deaf people fingerspell. That's really the only way to get better.
 
Also an ASL student here. I'm constantly getting better at fingerspelling, but still have a lot of trouble keeping up with other people when they're fingerspelling to me and always have to ask them to slow down. And introductory sign language videos aren't much help since they sign painfully slow.
 
I will start ASL in the Fall, but I have gotten into the habbit of fingerspelling words I hear on TV... just anything that you feel like spelling will work.. doing that enough will help you tremendously! Good Luck!! :-D
 
When i can't concentrate, i start fingerspelling what I'm hearing. :) so its just practice hehe! i've gotten a lot better over the last few weeks, from just practicing and practicing :)
 
afifan91 said:
I will start ASL in the Fall, but I have gotten into the habbit of fingerspelling words I hear on TV... just anything that you feel like spelling will work.. doing that enough will help you tremendously! Good Luck!! :-D
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avreethequirky said:
When i can't concentrate, i start fingerspelling what I'm hearing. :) so its just practice hehe! i've gotten a lot better over the last few weeks, from just practicing and practicing :)
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i do that alot and when forget words im trying to say

heres my status in the local(not online) communities:

hearing "normal" culture: disabled
Deaf culture: deaf wannabe
Deafblind culture: DEAFBLIND
 
justinram11 said:
Hello! I just wanted to say I've been reading on AllDeaf for awhile now and decided to ask a question. I am taking a ASL 1 class at my high school and kind of ended up in there by accident. I LOVE the class (dare I say my favorite?) and have a fabulous teacher! I seem to pick up on signs very quick but am terrible at fingerspelling! I've gotten better at receiving using asl.ms, but my expressive is terrible!! xD

My fingers always get all bunched up and I seem to add random "i"s and "a"s into my words. If i do manage to get the word out, its very choppy, and not fluent at all. I don't have many opportunities to practice fingerspelling (or ASL at all for that matter) as I don't know that many people who also know it :P

Anyway, Thanks for any input anyone can give! I'm absolutely loving ASL and am finding the little I know of deaf culture very interesting!
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I have the same exact problem!!! I actually just changed my major from film to deaf ed thanks to ASL 1
 
Auntie Reba. I have physical problems with my hands. Any suggestions for improving my signing? I try to slow down but then I'm dreadfully slow. Not because of my skills but because my hands won't cooperate.

I value your opinion. Thanks in advance!
 
sallylou said:
Auntie Reba. I have physical problems with my hands. Any suggestions for improving my signing? I try to slow down but then I'm dreadfully slow. Not because of my skills but because my hands won't cooperate.

I value your opinion. Thanks in advance!
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It's a common problem that terps experience because of repetitive motion injury, and older deaf signers get because of arthritis. Then, some people have congenital or injury problems that interfere with finger spelling.

It kind of depends on how your physical problems are manifested in your signing, so I can just give you some general ideas.

I'm not a doctor (and I don't even play one on TV) but I would think that you should first deal with the underlying physical problems, if possible, before worrying about the signing.

Some general tips are, warm up and stretch your arms, shoulders, hands, and fingers prior to signing. While signing, occasionally pause and shake out your hands and arms, or shift to a more comfortable position.

Hot wax dips and massage can be soothing for the hands and fingers.

Don't worry about signing speed. If you're signing conversationally, being smooth and accurate is more important than being fast. Speed is for the terps to worry about during assignments. But for chatting, it's not as critical.

With repetition, your hands and arms will develop muscle memory for the signs, so the effort should lesson.

Have you gotten any feedback from the people who sign with you? Are they saying that your speed is a problem for them receptively?

As you develop your signing style, economy of movement will increase. That means, the time and space between signs will flow better, with time and distance between signs condensing. Each sign doesn't need to be completely formed in the classic textbook model before starting the next sign. It's not "sloppy" signing but more like using contractions in English.

Perhaps other ADers with similar experiences can add some more suggestions. :)
 
sallylou said:
Auntie Reba. I have physical problems with my hands. Any suggestions for improving my signing? I try to slow down but then I'm dreadfully slow. Not because of my skills but because my hands won't cooperate.

I value your opinion. Thanks in advance!
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Reba said others could give you opinions. I love giving opinions.

My husband's hands are very arthritic. I understand him fine, and he doesn't force his hands all the way to a position that hurts.

I say just go as close as you can without pain, and people who sign with you regularly will learn to understand.
 
Bottesini said:
Reba said others could give you opinions. I love giving opinions.

My husband's hands are very arthritic. I understand him fine, and he doesn't force his hands all the way to a position that hurts.

I say just go as close as you can without pain, and people who sign with you regularly will learn to understand.
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:thumb:
 
Muscle memory? I had no idea! That would help.

Thanks for your feedback, Reba and Bott. No one has complained but I feel pressured to speed up my signing. I don't want the be the slow newbie. lol

I take pain meds that help. I don't want to use Icey Hot at a restaurant because it stinks too bad. I tried capascin cream but it burned my sensitive skin. Maybe I can take my heating pad and find an outlet.
 
sallylou said:
Muscle memory? I had no idea! That would help.

Thanks for your feedback, Reba and Bott. No one has complained but I feel pressured to speed up my signing. I don't want the be the slow newbie. lol

I take pain meds that help. I don't want to use Icey Hot at a restaurant because it stinks too bad. I tried capascin cream but it burned my sensitive skin. Maybe I can take my heating pad and find an outlet.
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So, heat helps?

Have you tried any of these products?

Amazon.com: Handwarmers: Camping & Hiking: Sports & Outdoors

As a last resort, sometimes I sit on my hands to warm them up. Cheap and portable. :giggle:
 
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