Considerations
In the United States, approximately 1 million people communicate via American Sign Language. However, the process for learning sign language varies greatly due to factors including family background and age at the time of hearing loss. ASL is just as complete and grammatically complex as a spoken language, and fluency is only achieved through a lot of practice and contact with native speakers.
Multigenerational Deaf Families
Due to certain genetic disorders, deafness can be passed down through multiple generations. In these families, a deaf child learns sign language naturally from watching his parents and family members. Cognitive neuroscience studies conducted at Dartmouth College show that deaf and hearing babies exposed to sign language will "babble" in signs just as hearing babies make sounds mimicking spoken language. The study confirmed the linguistic acquisition process is the same for deaf and hearing children when they are given equal access to language.
Deaf Children in Hearing Families
Nine out of 10 deaf children are born to hearing families, so these children tend to learn sign language less fluently or later than deaf children from deaf families. Many deaf schools offer residential programs where students live on-campus during the school year. There the students learn sign language from interaction with their peers. ASL-centered deaf schools also offer ASL classes that teach deaf students the linguistic rules of their language in the same way grammar and spelling are taught in other language classes.
Late-Deafened People
Out of the 28 million Americans with severe to profound hearing loss, only one in 1,000 people are born deaf. The majority of deaf people lose their hearing later in life, either from later-onset diseases, head trauma, noise-induced hearing damage, or presbycusis--hearing loss brought on by old age. Many late-deafened people have already learned to speak, read and write, and choose to use amplification technology and lip-reading instead of learning ASL. However, late-deafened people who do choose to learn sign language usually do so in a classroom setting much like hearing ASL students. Sign language courses for both deaf and hearing individuals are available at colleges, churches and community centers for the deaf.
Tags: deaf hearing, sign language, deaf children, deaf schools, hearing babies