Why Speech Isn't That Great

[Sweetmind]

http://www.deafeducation.org/stories/whyspeech.html


THE TRUTH

WHY SPEECH ISN'T THAT GREAT BACK

My mum was only seventeen when she had me, her first daughter. She was shocked when she discovered I was Deaf. She'd never met a Deaf person before. She'd heard about Deafness of course, but she knew little about it so she was really thrown into a panic when she found out. She was only seventeen years old herself and she didn't know how she would cope with a Deaf child.

She was persuaded by "experts" just to treat me like a "normal" hearing child; that deafness was not like being handicapped because a Deaf child's brain and body are normal, and that she should bring me up normally.

She decided to send me to a mainstream school where there were four of us, Deaf children in a school full of hearing kids. Really, I have no memories of my time at that school, only what my mum and dad has told me since about why I left it. Apparently, a social worker advised my parents to move me to a special school for the Deaf in Southport because it had been noted that I had communication problems. My parents took me for a look around the school and they really like it - it was huge and looked really posh and they were impressed by it because our family was quite poor at that time. They felt it would be a fantastic school for me particularly because there were older Deaf students there aged 14 or 15 who had great speech. I was only 4 or 5 at the time so my parents saw these kids and imagined their daughter growing up to become like that too. They were determined that was the right school for me. I wasn't so keen - I was upset to be leaving my friends, but once I was there I settled in well - it felt normal really. I soon became part of the gang because we were all the same. I wasn't left out and lonely anymore. We all played together out in the playground - hopscotch or whatever. It was an oral school. At that age, we didn't have formal classes as such. We did art and sport and the teachers taught us basic stuff like how to tie our shoelaces. I didn't really sign at that time. I didn't learn to sign properly until later because I'd never met a fluent Deaf signer, only Deaf people like me - from hearing families who had gone to oral schools.

Of course, we used gesture and a few of our own made up signs to communicate with each other. We didn't know any different. I thought all Deaf people were the same as us. Remember as well, I was only in my first year at that school. I do remember seeing the older, Year 4 kids signing to each other more fluently and thinking how silly they looked, without realising that me and my friends were doing exactly the same - we signed to each other too really, in a way.

Within the classroom, everything was strictly oral. The teachers used to repeat everything over and over and over again so that we could lipread them. They would write down what they were saying too, on the board, and then repeat it again. They would constantly be telling us to watch their lips and concentrate, or asking us to repeat their words. The actual content of their classes was pitiful - we learned very little. I was very shy that first year at high school. I always hung back because I wasn't confident about pushing myself forward or mixing with people. There were some kids in class who always had their hand up to contribute, but not me. I was too shy. I changed later though.

I think one of the big reasons for me changing can be traced back to a holiday my mum sent me on when I was about seven. She thought it would be great for me to go. I met another Deaf girl there, about the same age as me, but she was a fluent signer. I mean full on British Sign Language. I couldn't understand her at all. I thought she was really silly signing away like that and that she should be trying to speak, like me. I didn't really know anything about BSL at that time. We couldn't communicate properly and we really clashed and argued the whole holiday. It wasn't until I was back at school that I realised that I had a lot to thank her for. She had taught me the fingerspelling alphabet - A - Z and it really helped me. I used to spell out words on my hands under the table, testing if they felt right - it improved my work and I was never caught. I never really associated that with sign language though, or as something for Deaf people, it was just something useful.

When I finally moved up to my first year of higher school I was so excited and my mum was proud to see her daughter growing up. At that school I had speech therapy lessons every week. It was a special one hour class that took place during lunch break so I either had to scoff my lunch down quickly before I dashed off to class or do the speech therapy first then grab something to eat before regular lessons started again, so I never really got a break. It was only those of us who couldn't talk clearly that had to go to speech therapy. The students with good speech didn't have to go. They would train us how to pronounce different words. It was boring and I didn't want to do it really because I didn't think speech was important until I was 12 or 13. It was around that age that I started believing that speech was the answer.

At home, my family are all hearing. My sister who is 3 years younger than me and my brother, five years younger than me and my parents - they are all really close knit, really close to each other. I always felt left out. Whenever we had house parties or friends over I could see them all getting on together while I was left to one side. They would all chat away and I suddenly thought "That's it! Speech! That's the answer! If I could learn to speak I could fit in." That's why I forced myself to keep trying hard in the speech therapy lessons, trying to improve my speech. But it wasn't the answer really. When my family chatted, they did it naturally, talking over each other, moving around etc. They are hearing. Whenever I tried to interrupt to ask what I had missed or ask them to repeat or whatever, they would just brush me off or say they would tell me later. It was so frustrating.

It was no better in school either really. All our classes, English, Maths, Science, whatever, were taught in spoken English and the teacher would be talking to us then turn their back to write on the board while they were still talking! How were we supposed to follow what they were saying? And everything was just so slow. One paragraph which should take five minutes to get through would end up taking an hour because the teacher had to make sure everybody got it, that everyone had understood what they had said.

I didn't go to a Deaf Club until I was 13. That was the first time I went! I remember walking in and being a bit daunted because everyone was signing away furiously. I spotted one girl that I was sure I recognised…then I realised where I had seen her before - it was the girl I'd all those fights with on that holiday when we were seven! She was still signing and I of course was still very oral at that time, speaking and gesturing. She helped me out and taught me a few more signs and before long, I was just picking it up naturally. As I became more confident in my signing I remember feeling quite proud that I had a choice of two ways to communicate - speech/lipreading and signing. However, when I got back to school, I realised I was finding things really difficult to follow compared to at the Deaf Club. And that's when it really hit me. I'm Deaf! I should be signing! It's natural. I have poor speech; well I can't help that, so what?

But at the same time I was desperate to make my family proud of me. They didn't sign and if I wanted to become a part of their close relationship, I would have to speak. Yet they always make me feel left out. They were forever telling me "Oh you're special, you're so special" and then just cutting me out. It felt like they were patronising me, calling me special.

My new signing skills made me quite popular at school because at school we never saw anyone using proper BSL. The other kids would always be asking me "What's the sign for this or that." It felt great. I'd never been popular before so I really enjoyed the attention.

In class though, I become increasing bored and uninterested. I never really considered the importance of education - it didn't seem important. The important thing for me at that time was signing. School was just something I had to do.

I was still forcing myself to try hard with my speech therapy though, hoping it would help me at home. I was always on at mum and dad to take me to the Deaf Club, which was a fair way from our house - 15 minutes drive. They often refused and we would row but I wanted to stay on their good side so they would let me go so when they asked me to do favours or help round the house I would do it. The problem was, I didn't always understand why they'd asked me to do - I only get bout 80% of what any mum says, through lipreading - so if I did it wrong, we'd end up in another row. Those breakdowns in communication caused me a lot of frustration and stress in my teenage years. I never showed how I was feeling in school. I would always hide my frustration and like everything was fine, and keep going to the speech therapy to please my family. There were other Deaf kids at the school, some 3 or 4 years younger than me, that had fantastic speech. For them it came naturally. I used to hate it because they would always get favourable treatment. For example, every year the school put on a drama show. Now I absolutely hate drama. I'm sure I'd make a great actress because I feel like acting is just something I have inside of me - I just love getting up there and performing. And yet the drama teacher at school always put me in the background and the kids with good speech got all the best parts, even if they couldn't act. It made me so jealous. I so wanted to be able to speak. I wished I was hearing with all my heart. I was so frustrated. My family and my school both valued speech so much and I had tried so hard to please them.

It wasn't fair. It made me sick to see those kids get the best parts. Oh sure, they could speak well but they couldn't act to save their lives and there I was, desperate for the chance to show I could act, shoved to the back of the stage. It's because that whole school's philosophy was obsessed with ears. It was all about ears, all about education, all bout speech. I don't get it.

All of my frustrations finally started to spill out in my 4th year at school. I started to get into a lot of trouble. I'd be cheeky to the teachers, or ignore them, or skip classes. I would never help out the teachers or do them a favour. I just pretend I didn't understand what they were saying to me. Do your own favour!

I was still ignorant about how poor my education had been. Everything at school had been totally focused around listening and speaking and lipreading and hearing aids, but there was no real education, not really.

Finally I was able to leave school. I was delighted to get away from that environment where I felt frustrated and jealous all the time because others could speak better than me. I decided I wanted to go to college to study drama and this was agreed with the staff at the school, that they would arrange this, but when I turned up to college the following September they told me I was enrolled on a GNVQ course in Communications! Weird! I never asked for that course. It turned out that the school had liased with the college and had advised them to put me on the GNVQ course because they felt I needed to learn more about computers. I was so used to doing what they told me that I just accepted their advice and followed their decision. God knows why, because I have absolutely no interest in computers, whatsoever! The class looked alright though, because I could see there were other Deaf in there signing away. Also, it seems like we would be left to get on with the work in our own space, not watched the whole time. There were three other Deaf students there that I knew from school and the rest of the class were all hearing. We had a notetaker with us but they were crap! I sat near a girl who had been in the higher classes at school because her speech was good. I missed what the lecturer was saying I would ask her to fill me in, but if we had both not been able to lipread it, we would look at the notes, but they weren't much help because they were just full of hard words that I didn't understand.

To be honest, most of my year at that college was spent gassing with my friends in sign language, talking about the weekend or someone's party, while the lecturer waffled on at the front of the room. Every now and then, we'd get a bit noisy and the tutor would tell us to get on with our work. I learned the most from my year at college from travelling around to meet up with Deaf students at other colleges like Derby. I learned that many Deaf people like me have suffered through a poor education. Being part of that wider Deaf community finally brought me to an understanding of who I am. I am a Deaf person. That is part of who I am and I have accepted it now. All my life I had tried my hardest to learn to speak like a hearing person. All that effort and my speech is still not great, not really. I did my best to please my family. I was always so bitterly jealous of the relationship my brother and my sister had with each other and with Mum and Dad. They seemed to have the perfect life - no problems at schools, no problems lurking in the background, nothing. I hated myself because I was Deaf. I hated myself so much. It wasn't until later that I learned to accept it. I feel that my school and all the speech therapy I did really brainwashed me into thinking that it was my fault but actually I can't help it if I can't speak well. I felt I was thick because they put me in all the lower classes yet when I look back, I realise I'm not thick. I remember one friend of the same age who was in the higher class - I was always helping her with her work. I knew loads of the answers. I remember complaining to my mum that I should be in the higher class and my mum replying that yes, I was a very clever girl but despite that, I had to be in the lower class but I am very very very Deaf. I can't tell you how angry that makes me!! That is just so wrong! What a waste of my time and my talents. They gave me no hope in my life, any aspirations or dreams that the world might be a fantastic place. The only thing that school gave me was the feeling that life is a constant battle, and that in the fight to be like a hearing person, I would always lose. But it wasn't until college that I found out these things about myself and my life.

I quit that college after a year but I left feeling strong. I was determined to go to a Deaf college with full access in sign language. I left with my GNVQ qualification but it didn't excite me - I took no interest in that. I was a two year fight to get me into Derby College for Deaf People, but finally I got it. Everyone there signed - it was fantastic! Many of the other students had similar stories to mine; some had been in mainstream schools. Most of them though were from the South of England. I learned a lot during my time there. Essentially I came to realise that Deaf and hearing people are all equal. Deaf people often encounter problems when communication breaks down, they might struggle with written English or have trouble getting people to understand their speech. But communication problems happen for hearing people too. There are loads of hearing people who cannot read or write well. I never knew that before.

I'm 21 years old now and I've yet to find what it is I want out of life. Deep down I feel that one day I will be working on a professional level with Deaf people. I definitely believe that. Things are happening late in life for me and looking back I just wish that, if I had my time again, my mum would put me into a signing school right from the start. My life would have been so much better.

I used to be angry with my family. I tried my best to please them by trying to talk. And yet outside of my immediate family, people couldn't understand me. My uncles or my granddad who I only saw every 2 or 3 months would always be asking mum what I had said. They couldn't really be bothered with it and would have a laugh with my brother or sister instead. Although, I was the eldest, I never really had that position in my family. In fact, I feel that the roles were reversed and that my little sister was the one that looked out for me. I hated that.

Now I'm at a local college doing GCSE English, well pre- GCSE English. It's ok. I have a communication support worker - finally I have access to a local college and I can live at home while I study, not have to travel. It's only five minutes round the corner.

At first I thought it was going to be fantastic, having a CSW to give me access in BSL, but I'm really not happy with the way things are going. Quite regularly, the tutors take all the hearing students off to have group discussions where they have the opportunity to share their comments and opinions I'd really like to be involved in that but unfortunately they seem to have decided that me and the CSW should work alone. At first I thought maybe the CSW would work with me one to one and help me catch up with the others, but it turns out that the CSW wants to use that time to translate written English texts into BSL for me. But I don't have any great problems reading English! I've got hearing family and went to an oral school - I was always having to lipread English or read English. I never learned BSL in school, only English so although my education was poor, my English skills weren't bad - I knew the words. Also, I know that BSL and hearing English are completely different so to translate from one to the other wouldn't be great for me. I pointed this out to the CSW but they have insisted on carrying on working this way and it's just so slow. I don't want to work like that, but….

Anyway, I'm hoping to get into the Year Zero course at Preston University this September. I'm hoping that they might trust me that I'm bright enough to get on with work on my own without being babied.

Gemma

Thank you!
Sweetmind