Hearing Mom, Hearing Child. ASL or PSE?

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Rojo

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I signed with my son from birth. It was hugely beneficial. He had a vocabulary of about 90 signs that he used until around two when the balance between sign and speech shifted to speech. Since he could speak clearly enough to make himself understood, there wasn't much external motivation for him to sign anymore. Six months later, I've started contemplating second languages. Sign language seems an obvious choice, but since we live in the hearing world, should we stick with PSE (not SEE) instead of ASL? My gut says most people will say, "Aim for ASL. Chances are you'll fall short and end up speaking a form of PSE anyway." Though some others might say, "You're a native English speaker. Don't try to teach a language you're not fluent in. Stick with PSE." Thoughts? I'm also interested in knowing how people -feel- about me trying to teach my hearing child to sign. I don't want to try and introduce him into a world where he may not be welcome. Thanks in advance for sharing your expertise!
 
Hellol welcome to alldeaf Rojo

I really expertise to alots of easy skills visual sign language development to skills education ASL motivated. I experience SEE translate to easy beat to do it ASL I thought to clear to understand ASL. I can expertiment reading to visual to ASL. Don't be afraid! It is very alots of for modify the ASL easy how visual individual to grammar!
 
The both of you are very much welcome in my book. I think teaching him any language opens him up to learning about future cultures he may be introduced to - either cultures based upon hearing/not hearing or based upon a nationality. If a stranger started talking to me in a language I could understand - ASL or PSE - I would be happy to talk to them, and I wouldn't care if they aren't in any way related to someone who is deaf. It's a good skill to have.

As for PSE/ASL - you should consider that one of the benefits of teaching a child a second language is that it teaches the brain to form sentences in a new sentence structure. ASL has a different sentence structure. So does German, French, Italian, etc. The syntax is different. It also helps you learn other languages quickly down the road. I would suggest to start with ASL. I'm stating this purely as my own personal opinion, but I think that learning foreign languages as a child it helped me when I needed to learn ASL as a young adult. I had experience learning dutch & flemish, german, french, italian, & spanish.... and when I speak now if I don't know a word either spoken or signed I have developed a strength in quickly changing the way I say a sentence to compensate so you would never know instead of hammering through "in english" and fingerspelling far more frequently.
 
If you want him to be bilingual, he should learn ASL. You wouldn't modify French to be "more englishy" just because his first language is English, so why do that with ASL?
 
That's a big sore point in the deaf community. Hearing children are rushed to learn sign, but deaf children denied sign.
 
Thanks!

Looks like there's no harm in working on ASL. Thanks everyone for your input, and encouragement. I've started reintroducing sign, and it's going well so far.
 
Bottesini said:
That's a big sore point in the deaf community. Hearing children are rushed to learn sign, but deaf children denied sign.
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I think may have to do with how the parents feel about having their child learn to sign. It should be up to the child if they want to learn ASL and not the parents.
 
Rojo said:
Looks like there's no harm in working on ASL. Thanks everyone for your input, and encouragement. I've started reintroducing sign, and it's going well so far.
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welcome to warm alldeaf... enjoy for you :)

Great :) you doing to love ASL motivate sign language!
 
I just want to add my 2 cents here:
I am a hearing mom who was raising a hearing child. We watched all the signing time videos and did baby sign classes. Other signing babies signed cat and dog... my son signed lion and zebra and bat.

The other moms, my best friends included, attributed his crazy skills to my efforts. In truth, I think they thought I was a bit of a show off.

He turned 3, he speech came in and he dropped most of his sign. I was a little sad, but I didn't push it.

Other babies did baby sign, my son was acquiring ASL as a language. Have you guessed why yet?

Fast forward 6 years and my son was just diagnosed with a moderate hearing loss. He was fitted for hearing aids a month ago. He has no speech difficulty and speaks well in English and French, but I had him tested on a whim because he was having a hard time following instructions at school.

Anyhow, I just wanted to say that just because you and your son are currently "hearing" - you never know!

Best of luck!
 
ASL as it is a language while PSE and SEE aren't.
 
Here's the problem with the "ASL" labeling, you have people who go around saying they sign in ASL but realistically they sign more in a PSE format than anything else. This is because they grew up with the English language and they incorporated the English habit into their signing because that's how their brain thinks. One deaf professor kept claiming the signing is ASL when obviously looking at the videos the signing has a strong English structure to it.

SEE is Signing Exact English which is a visual representation of the English language with all of its grammar and syntax intact.

I'd say whatever you can do to provide any visual language access allowing the complete language/communication access whether it's ASL, PSE, SEE or even Cued Speech is fine in my book. Because with any of those you can easily maintain constant and unencumbered dialogue, all done visually. As always, as long as the parents make an informed decision, I will support them regardless of their decision. I may disagree but I will support them nonetheless. Can other people do the same?
 
kokonut said:
Here's the problem with the "ASL" labeling, you have people who go around saying they sign in ASL but realistically they sign more in a PSE format than anything else. This is because they grew up with the English language and they incorporated the English habit into their signing because that's how their brain thinks. One deaf professor kept claiming the signing is ASL when obviously looking at the videos the signing has a strong English structure to it.

SEE is Signing Exact English which is a visual representation of the English language with all of its grammar and syntax intact.

I'd say whatever you can do to provide any visual language access allowing the complete language/communication access whether it's ASL, PSE, SEE or even Cued Speech is fine in my book. Because with any of those you can easily maintain constant and unencumbered dialogue, all done visually. As always, as long as the parents make an informed decision, I will support them regardless of their decision. I may disagree but I will support them nonetheless. Can other people do the same?
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What about Speaking Exact ASL? That should be included.
 
kokonut said:
Here's the problem with the "ASL" labeling, you have people who go around saying they sign in ASL but realistically they sign more in a PSE format than anything else. This is because they grew up with the English language and they incorporated the English habit into their signing because that's how their brain thinks. One deaf professor kept claiming the signing is ASL when obviously looking at the videos the signing has a strong English structure to it.

SEE is Signing Exact English which is a visual representation of the English language with all of its grammar and syntax intact.

I'd say whatever you can do to provide any visual language access allowing the complete language/communication access whether it's ASL, PSE, SEE or even Cued Speech is fine in my book. Because with any of those you can easily maintain constant and unencumbered dialogue, all done visually. As always, as long as the parents make an informed decision, I will support them regardless of their decision. I may disagree but I will support them nonetheless. Can other people do the same?
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you are serious kidding no offense. what are you talking to you own your life Cue Speech!. It is wise careful avoid for you!.
 
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