Can you imagine not knowing what to call anything in your environment and attempting to gesture and point to get your message across? This is a reality for so many of my students who don't learn through incidental learning methods and require direct teaching.
I work in a dual language deaf education classroom working with first through fifth grade students.
My students come from various backgrounds and home situations though they all share one common element, that is their mode of communication, American Sign Language. Many of my students don't have the ability to communicate their needs until they are school-age and then it is only during the hours they are at school, because their families don't share their language.
My Project
Every time a child learns how to name something in their environment, they are empowered to communicate. Having photographs of real items, and not cartoon drawings, will open a world of understanding, which are the building blocks of developing a language system they can share with their families. Help my students have the benefits we do to know the world around them.
Every time I turn around, I find there is another word my students don't know.
For example I was talking to my students about making sandwiches and one student asked if we could have bacon. Another student had no idea what they were talking about and we had to find a picture before a connection could be made and an understanding reached.
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