This is why you suck at ASL #signlanguage #americansignlanguage #asl #coda #learnasl

[ellie]

My ASL teacher is deaf, so sometimes she talks if we don’t understand what she is signing, but most of the time, we figure it out. I tell everyone to find a deaf ASL teacher. It really makes a difference

[The-luna-wolf]

Took ASL for 3 years with the same teacher. The first day was the only day an interpreter was there. The remainder of the year we were not allowed to talk in class and strictly signed. If we did need to talk (because you know, we are confused) we needed to sign what we asked to be respectful to our teacher. Loved every second of it

[kzcreationzmore]

This is exactly how I got fairly fluent in spanish. I had the same spanish teacher for 4 years and he would talk almost exclusively in spanish and it was up to us to understand it. He also taught ACTUAL spanish, not the textbook stupid spanish. He lived in a spanish speaking country for a large portion of his life, and he learned spanish the same way he taught it in his classroom and it helped so much. He also would give us homework assignments such as to go to a mexican restaurant and order exclusively in Spanish. Of course, the homework was optional, but I actually did that several times and it helped build my confidence up. His class was the “advanced” spanish class, and it was simply because he actually forced us to learn spanishz all the other teachers would repeat themselves in English, and their class suffered for it. He was an amazing teacher and I am so lucky to have gotten the chance to learn from him!

[materialgawd]

My asl teacher was deaf, but she chose specific days to only do Asl, those days we were also required to only speak in asl in the rest of our classes. The isolation was immense. She was in contact with our other teachers and they were told to tattle if we used our voices
Edit: this included other students were supposed to tattle. I believe this was supposed to make us only talk to each other, limiting who we were able to speak to.
As in, it was a direct example of how isolating it can be

[LyrenaWithAnxiety]

My ASL teacher fingerspelled attendance so we would pay attention and learn

[dragonize]

Super true, I remember as I started learning Korean, plenty of bilingual Koreans said to learn the Korean alphabet IN Korean (the characters) rather than using the romanized version because 1. It's very simple and 2. if you only use the romanized version, you'll have SO many issues further down the line.

[theredvelvetwitch]

When I took ASL in high school, the whole class sucked at fingerspelling and so we were doing fingerspelling pop quizzes long after we were supposed to bc lots of people were still failing. Once she made up gibberish words to sign as an April Fools joke 😅

[scutoid-backrooms]

its good for beginners to start understanding the differences between ASL and spoken english by seeing the exact same thought conveyed both ways. but it needs to be phased out near the start of learning

[Chair....]

The way that my course teaches it, is that when introducing the signs, the teacher will say “Car” *signs car* etc, etc. That’s the only time that words are spoken, when introducing new words. On all my assignments, especially receptive story assignments, I’m given a video of two signers having a conversation, and I have to follow along and answer questions about the conversation such as “What did signer 1 say her name was?” Or “Where does signer 2 work?” Followed by “How many years has signer 2 worked at this place?” In my personal opinion, it’s been very effective, and I always have the option to turn off the volume on the vocabulary videos.

[huggles]

My asl teacher refused to speak in class. After his introduction and telling us the sign for understand (or don’t understand) the rest of the class was him tapping on object, signing object and asking if we understood only other time he spoke was to explain why some people were signing ‘nice to meet you’ wrong (some were using ✌️instead of ☝️- Basically changing the word for meet to mean slang for s3ggs) so yea that was the only time he stoped the class and spoke 😂 don’t wanna make that mistake introducing yourself

[wintig]

I think if you're a total beginner, yes, talking and signing is probably more beneficial. It's like how in the first year of learning a language the teacher will likely speak to you in the language you already know since in your first year you usually don't have enough vocabulary to comprehend entire sentences yet.

[kaiwagner]

My ASL teacher day 1 spoke to tell us if you're not ready for a class that's silent, you have a week to learn ABCs and Numbers. The rest of the semester was silent. I got overwhelmed and overstimulated in most classes because I have ADHD and am hard of hearing, but this class was perfect! No note taking, no worries if I didn't know a sign, as long as I could finger spell, I didn't have to worry. Visual and hand on, ten out of ten. Just make sure you keep that to your study groups too!!

[renbaker]

Im glad my professor doesnt do this. One of the first things he told us was to turn off our voices when we sign. He wont even let us tell someone what a sign they don't know means- we fingerspell it to them. He has a PhD in ASL.

[PriscillaV]

Also! . . .

Teachers that make sure their class is seated in front of them.

Sounds crazy, but I had a class in a room that was a long narrow rectangle, only four seats deep but 30 seats wide. It was a nightmare.

[crittersandcreatures]

If we’re talking while my ASL teacher tries to say something, he’ll just start signing at top speed and expect us to follow it perfectly, because clearly if we’re not paying attention we must be fully confident that we don’t need to hear what he’s saying! Man, I love that guy.

[MorganMakesThings]

My ASL teacher was a CODA and would talk and sign, especially when she was repeating terms. It helps with memory building. We used to do similar things in HS French class; pairing gestures with words to help cement the memory. My biggest weakness with fingerspelling is if the signer is going fast (not native or Fluent in ASL), I can't cognitively translate the letters, spell it, and then realize what I'm spelling before I forget the beginning. It would be like a first semester German student having a long German word containing ß and ü spelled out rapid fire and being expected to know it immediately.

Also, if I told my teacher to shut up, even in college...I'd be having some major problems.

[dahoomanshroom]

My teacher would do this, but we also had a deaf kid in our class, and she'd also put ear plugs in, so we had to respond to her in ASL. She rarely ever spoke when she was signing, and if she did, it was because she was teaching us new signs or was teaching and interpreting for him. He knew ASL he took the class because he thought it would be an easy pass for him.😂

[abra.kadabra.and.alakazam]

THANK YOU!!! My mom is an ASL teacher and my principal keeps telling her to talk and sign because "the teacher last years did that and it worked fine." Shes going to try again next year when all the ASL 2 kids are gone that actually saw the old teacher and hopefully she wont get ans many complaints (unfortunately there will always be some because kids keep taking the class because it "easy" 🙄)

[anarchicbean]

Randomly been getting your videos lately, and it has made me wanna learn ASL just for the sake of learning it. Never once met anyone who was deaf/HoH or spoke in ASL for any reason. Today I was a guest speaker in a grade 3 class and I noticed a student with his interpreter as they signed in ASL together. I then noticed the classroom was full of diagrams on alphabets with the associated sign for them, and students even had their names taped to their desks with the signs for their names underneath. Definitely really hit me in that moment a lot more.

[ddyert]

My asl teacher is deaf im not gonna tell him to shut up and pick one lol