Jenny Willetts: To sign or to speak? Why it doesn’t have to be a choice

I am a Teacher of the Deaf. It’s a job I have done for over twenty years and I’ve worked in a variety of settings with learners of different ages. It’s a job that has its up and downs and inevitable frustrations, just like any other, but it’s a job I love.

Quite often, people do not understand my job. So you work with Deaf children? Yes. You work in a school for the Deaf? No. Are all the children you work with Deaf? No. Do the children wear hearing aids? Some of them. Do the children have cochlear implants? Some. So, these children are hearing then? Not exactly. But they don’t need to sign, right? Some of them do. Are the children taught separately? Sometimes. 

This last one in particular seems to throw people. Even other teachers. I am currently doing my Senco training which involves attending lectures at University for ten days over the year and writing some essays, which I have completely forgotten how to do.

University isn’t like it was in the early nineties. There are fair trade coffee shops, organic cafes and not a refectory in sight. There are apps for giving student discounts, which I was thrilled to discover. Free Amazon Prime for a year? Yes, please! 

Anyway, I digress. During the course of my Senco training, we talk a lot about what happens in our particular schools or settings. Sometimes this is boring, a bit like when people show you their holiday photos or tell you in detail about the dream they had last night.

Other teachers don’t necessarily understand why Deaf children in a mainstream school aren’t taught for 100% of the time in class. They talk about Inclusion but don’t necessarily understand what Inclusion is. The reasons are numerous and too complicated to go in to here so that might be one for another time.

I’m going to go back to the beginning where I said that it is a job with frustrations just like any other. One thing I have discovered over the past few years, when I have been Senco in my school as well as a ToD, is that people frequently take the word of many other professionals over the word of educators.

I have lost count of the times that my colleagues or I have advised parents that their child would benefit from X, Y or Z support only for them not to be ready to hear it yet. I have also been told outright that I am wrong about my judgments of some children. That is a parent’s prerogative.

However, it is endlessly frustrating when a medical professional who may meet a child only once tells gives their advice about something, and it is taken on board and acted upon. Sadly, I think it is as a result of the poor status of the teaching profession. Everyone seems to be an expert on schools and education.

The one that relates to my ToD role specifically is about advice from medical professionals given to parents about modes of communication, and which settings they should be sending their cochlear implanted child to.

I have read letters from doctors outlining how we as a setting should be teaching the named child, which is akin to me writing to a surgeon outlining how they should remove a body part. Sort of.

Often, parents are told that their implanted child should not be using any sign. The theory is that if children have access to sign then it will stop them from using and understanding speech. This theory is absolute nonsense. What is crucial to young minds is communication, in any form. Be that sign, speech, gesture or a mixture of all three. 

What we also need to bear in mind is that the majority of deaf children have hearing parents who may have no experience of deafness so they will listen to this advice by the book, often when in a very vulnerable state and whilst still coming to terms with their child’s diagnosis.

The outcome is that access to a mode of communication is removed while their child’s brain is still learning how to understand and process sounds and speech. This is in no way supposed to be a judgement about parental choice and the right to make decisions about their child. My concern is that the advice they are listening to may be misguided.  

Consequently, we sometimes have children who begin school without any communication beyond expressing their very basic needs and this includes those who have had a cochlear implant. You don’t need me to tell you how difficult this must be for any child.

Anyone with even a basic understanding of brain development will know that there is a critical period for developing any language and by removing sign it puts at risk a child’s potential to use and understand that language.

The setting I work in uses a Total Communication approach but we have at times been specifically asked by parents to not use signing with their child.

Again, this is a parent’s choice and that is their right but when their reason for making that particular choice is guided by professionals who have no understanding of education or language, that choice is at best misguided and at worst damaging for their child.

I understand that some parents take a long time to come to terms with their child’s diagnosis of deafness and that signing as a mode of communication for their child can seem scary and alien to them. For some parents the idea that their child could communicate in a way that they have no knowledge of must be difficult to accept.

A parent who wants their deaf child to use spoken language is not putting this development at risk if they also give their child access to sign language. It is called being bilingual. Obviously, there are many other factors at play, such as the level of hearing loss or technology used, but a child who has the potential to use spoken language will still have this potential if they use sign language. I am proof of that.

Jenny Willetts is a CODA, a hearing aid wearer and a Teacher of the Deaf. She likes to think she is an ok signer. She likes walking her dog and has an addiction to Diet Coke.