SW curriculum

[Barbara O'Dea]

Andree,

For clarification, would you mind responding to a couple of questions?

1. I know that ASL is used throughout Canada and both ASL and LSQ are 
used in Quebec. Would you tell us what QSL is and where it is used? 
Also, approximately what proportion of the Canadian Deaf community uses 
this language?

2. I am curious as to why you are proposing to introduce written QSL as 
a "first language" curriculum in the province of Ontario. What are you 
expecting to do with ASL, the existing predominant language of the Deaf 
community there?

3. You mentioned the Deaf school in Ottawa. Does the Deaf community in 
Ottawa use QSL?

I don't want to jump to conclusions and I''m sure I must have 
misunderstood something in your description because what I understand 
(or misunderstand) is akin to a group of educators in the hearing school 
system deciding the English-speaking community in Ontario should no 
longer use English and the students should be educated in some other 
language which is not generally used in the community, developing a 
curriculum for that language, and proposing it to the Ontario government.

I must be missing something and I sure would appreciate if you would 
give a further clarification of what you are proposing.

odeeodee



Andrée Gagnon wrote:

> Dear SW members,
>
>  
>
>       Because I feel that Val really ought to know who I am, what I do 
> and why I wish to establish contact with the SW members, please find  
> below my message.
>
>    
>
>       Firstly, I will introduce myself.  I am deafblind.  I attended 
> the Deaf school in Québec city ( Canada) and I grew up in their 
> dormitory.  I use Quebec Sign Language ( QSL). Since 1998, I am 
> professor in the Department of Education at the University of Ottawa
>
>  ( Ottawa is the capital of Canada).  I have been teaching six 
> different courses ( literacy and deafness: development of writing and 
> reading for deaf students.  The students can obtain a certificate of 
> deaf education in Ontario, Canada.
>
>  
>
>      At the Deaf school in Ottawa, a project called " Fais-moi signe" 
> ( in English, " Make me a sign") is being developed to be presented to 
> the Ontario Ministery of Education for their approval.   I am 
> preparing the QSL curriculum as the first language from kindergarten 
> to grade 2 ( 2006-2007), from grade 3 to grade 8 (2007-2008) and from 
> grade 9 to grade 12 ( 2008-2009).  Upon approval of the project, the 
> guide of QSL curriculum will be distributed to teachers of Deaf 
> students in the province of Ontario.
>
>  
>
>     And now I would like to learn more about SW curriculum.  Do you 
> have a Sign Writing curriculum from kindergarten to grade 12 for deaf 
> children, not adults?  To my knowledge I believe that only 2 teachers
>
>  ( Cecila Flood in USA, Stefan Worhenman in Germany and one 
> researcher(Kegl in Nicaragua)   (another may be Brazil) have been 
> teaching sign writing course to deaf children  since many years.  
> Also, I know that Juliette ( France), Katheren ( Belgium) and others ( 
> Germany- Swiss, and so on) have been teaching the Deaf children an 
> introduction to SW  for a few years. What about the popular hearing 
> trainers ( Val, Ingvil, Stefan)  and deaf trainers ( Therirry, Lucyna, 
> Stuart) who give to hearing and deaf adults an introduction to SW.
>
>  
>
>    While visiting the Centre of Total Communication in Danemark in 
> 1998, I asked the hearing and deaf teachers if they were using the SW 
> in the class in 1998 and the answer was no.
>
>  
>
>    I already checked your SW book for adults and also found you have a 
> few children books ( literature) for reading.  Do you have a strategic 
> instrument to teach deaf children how to read and write SW?  As an 
> example, French hearing children in grade 1 learn to form the regular 
> plural of the nouns by adding an " s": chat-chats ( in English, 
> cat-cats).  But, they cannot acquire the plural "aux"of nouns ending 
> in "al"  in grade 1: cheval-chevaux ( in English ox-oxen).  It is only 
> in grade 2  that the hearing children can acquire appropriately the 
> plural " aux" of the nouns  ending "al".
>
>     As the level of grades seems important for deaf children to 
> acquire the symbol of rotation, my question is : should it be in grade 
> 2 or in grade 3?  As far as  I am conserned I do not know.
>
>  
>
> Best regards
>
>  
>
>  
>
>  
>
> André Thibeault
>
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