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A common problem for Deaf/HH individuals is accessibility in a predominately hearing world. This topic is one that helps bring awareness to students and their community about strategies and the importance of knowing how to communicate in every day life. This includes things like adding closed captions to videos, making sure at restaurants people are prepared to take orders with a language barriers, etc. This article gave me the idea to have my students take time to think about this topic and how they might in appropriate ways educate their families, themselves, peers, and others in their lives to find ways to improve accessibility for Deaf and Hard of Hearing people.

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In my previous post , I spoke with Ruth MacMullen, an academic librarian and copyright specialist from York, about her experience of being deaf and how it affects how she uses the web. In this next post in the series, Ruth shares some of the things that make life easier for her on the web, and we offer some practical tips on how you can improve accessibility for deaf and hard of hearing people.
Provide subtitles/captions
"Subtitles, that's the really obvious one", remarks Ruth as we discuss the things that help her the most. In my previous post, she described the frustration of viewing a video posted on Facebook that lacked subtitles.
Subtitles or captions are the words shown at the bottom of videos that explain what's being said or what's happening. The term "subtitles" typically refers only to spoken content, whereas "captions" also includes descriptions of non-speech sounds, such as music, applause and laughter. Outside of North America, the terms are often used interchangeably. So when Ruth refers to subtitles on videos, that's what she's talking about.

This article by Tom Mitchell at JISC highlights the benefits of captions towards accessibility, and he describes how you can add them to videos on YouTube and Facebook.

Check the accuracy of captions

YouTube and Facebook (in the US) offer free automated video captioning-but since there aren't any humans involved, the captions they produce can be wildly inaccurate. "I've seen ones where irrelevant and inappropriate words, including expletives, came up!" remarks Ruth. "I was quite surprised there was no protection or filtering to stop those. I've also seen one where 'Nazi' and the 'S-word' came up in relation to an information literacy video-all in one sentence!"

Google provides clear instructions on how you can review and edit automated captions on YouTube. If you make use of automated captions, you need to take the time to edit them because automated captions are notoriously terrible to begin with. "It makes such a difference to a deaf person if a little bit of effort has been made to clean up subtitles", explains Ruth. "You can see they are so much more accurate."

Make sure that captions are synchronised with the audio

One advantage of using automated captioning is that the captions are automatically synchronised to the audio. Some video makers choose to generate their captions from an existing transcript. And if you do that, you need to make sure that each line appears on screen at about the same time that the audio is heard.

"When you're deaf, you want it to run in time" explains Ruth. She cites two examples of good practices: the Lynda.com training videos and the British Universities Film & Video Council's BoB (Box of Broadcasts) service. "I sometimes notice a couple of seconds' delay," Ruth remarks, "but on the whole, it's good."

Provide a summary of audio and video content

In my previous post, Ruth explained how a brief summary of what a video is about can be just as important as captions or a transcript. A video's summary may be as simple as a list of topics or songs that the video includes, which Ruth likens to "alternative text for someone with a hearing impairment".

Ruth recalls watching a concert on YouTube: "There's a piano player playing Gershwin songs and I'll think, 'Which one do I want to listen to?' I can't skip through and listen to fragments, I need to know what's in there before I make a choice to watch it. And I feel like I don't have that choice if I don't know what's in it."

Make sure that audio doesn't play automatically

Deaf and hard of hearing people may have a hard time gauging how loud videos are, particularly when they play automatically and unexpectedly. "You see a video on your Facebook feed and there's no sound", explains Ruth. "If you click on it to make it big, the sound plays, but you don't realise. Sometimes I have my hearing aid off and I feel like the video is blaring out sound."

Ruth describes how frustrating this can be when she doesn't even know that the webpage includes an auto-playing video: "Sometimes you're browsing the web and you get video adverts that play sound and you don't realise. That's caused a couple of embarrassing situations in the office." So try to avoid playing audio automatically, but if it's unavoidable, make sure that users have an easy way to turn it off.

Structure your content

In my previous post, Ruth emphasised the importance of structured content, such as headings, paragraphs, and lists. "I rely so much on visual information", she explains. "The more clearly it is structured and the more clear what it is, the better." Ruth is currently undertaking a law degree through distance learning, which involves using a virtual learning environment. "They're really good about their use of headings; they're very descriptive. If they weren't, I'd feel very lost because I completely rely on reading for understanding."

Using semantic HTML helps websites remain flexible and extensible. It makes the content reusable and conveys more meaning to assistive technologies. As Ruth points out, "This is good practice generally, but for people who are completely reliant on visual information, even more important."

Keep your content flexible

Underscoring each of these suggestions is an emphasis on clear communication and flexibility of content. Mobile technology has proven particularly useful to Ruth in this respect. "I think if you speak to any person with a disability, they will tell you that an iPhone or an Apple Watch is a game changer."

Ruth shares a blog post by Molly Watt, an inclusive technology advocate who is deaf-blind. Molly's post describes her experience of using an Apple Watch and the way that its haptic feedback has proven particularly useful for navigating.

The benefit that Ruth sees in such technology is being able to curate information in a way that suits her. "I can't hear a radio very well if it's in a room, but if I plug in my special Bluetooth headphones to my iPhone, I can listen to a radio programme. For me, it's a bit of a lifesaver in terms of being able to get information, get content, and modify it in a way that works for me."

Content that's flexible enough to be delivered by captions, indexed by transcripts, enlarged by screen magnifiers, and rendered by screen readers is a key principle of web accessibility. And while many of the tips in this post are useful for deaf and hard of hearing people, they ultimately benefit everyone.

Ruth is the copyright and licences officer at York St. John University in the UK, where she specialises in the legal aspects of information management. She blogs at librarianinlawland.com, and she tweets at @thehearinglib.

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Sounding out the web: accessibility for deaf and hard of hearing people [Part 2] - TPGi

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In my previous post , I spoke with Ruth MacMullen, an academic librarian and copyright specialist from York, about her experience of being deaf and how it affects how she uses the web.

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This is an idea that I want to incorporate in future classes because I believe it supports students in their passions/talents. Helps them work on vocabulary and gives them presentation and teaching opportunities. I think students learn best when they teach. So, in the units involving hobbies, families, places, occupations, etc. I will chose a student to come up with an activity or presentation that will encourage the use of that vocabulary and get students interacting with a topic that they have skills in or are passionate about.

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Structured Academic Controversy - Group Culture Debate

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Structured Academic Controversy - Group Culture Debate

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After viewing this video I will have my students consider their thoughts on the topic of oralism. Do you understand why this is a popular topic to be dated. I will have them share their own thoughts in a group discussion for class. This will be modeled after this debate that includes several members of the Deaf community who chose different language development paths.

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Should oralism be promoted within the deaf community? - BBC Newsnight

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For this activity I would split the class into two groups and have one "Receptive" group and one "Expressive" group. Then we would switch off. This gives students the opportunity to practice both their receptive and expressive skills in a low stress way. Working in groups will help students to make connections with how descriptive signs play a role in ASL when conveying stories, scenarios, and meaning. This will encourage receptive students to interpret and see how much being thorough and detailed with body language, facial expressions, and descriptive signs can impact how someone interprets what you are trying to say.

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Deaf “Telephone Game”: Visual Games for Bonding, Interaction and Inclusion!

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Project Based/ Tech Enhanced Learning - The Story Book Project

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Project Based/ Tech Enhanced Learning - The Story Book Project

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Working off of the idea from the idea in the article "Using Project-Based Learning to Teach World Languages" by Don Doehla I will have my students create their own children's story using a fictional or non fictional character from the Deaf Community. They will tell a story from that characters life. Using different apps they will make their storybook digital and learn to add the videos of them signing their story to the pages of the digital book itself. This will help my students make comparisons from their own cultures to that of the character in their book. It will also teach them to use technology in a Deaf friendly way and help them with expressive skills.

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The Challenges

Like other World Language teachers, I am constantly trying to focus on the essentials in order to create a standards-driven, communication-based curriculum for my students. I am also keen on addressing the necessary skills students must acquire for the 21st century as outlined in the wonderful document from the Carnegie Institute available at www.p21.org. How can I know whether I have achieved my desired objective? I need authentic assessments to evaluate target language proficiencies, while offering opportunities for greater engagement, for working in collaborative teams, for developing critical thinking skills, for managing precious time and resources, for emphasizing global themes, and for preparing students toward the new AP exam in French starting next year! On top of that, I want them to learn how to use proficiently the wonderful technology tools now available. Sound familiar? We work hard as teachers! Darn hard! Oui, monsieur, dur, dur!

The Rationale for PBL

And so I come to project-based learning as a way of bringing it all together. Projects provide opportunities for students to engage in real life communication, in context, with real people, and across the globe. I try to align my projects according to the California WL Standards, and the fluency stages of the Language Learning Continuum found in chapter 2 of the California World Languages Framework. I also keep the 21st Century skills in mind, along with the more familiar five C's from ACTFL, and the many things I have learned about literacy, and cross-cultural issues. I have found that the projects address all these things and more. I have tried to make sure that they also offer students the opportunity to be creative and to explore their potentials and aspirations. It is a lot of fun to see this in action. How about some examples?

Stage 1 Fluency Example: The Menu Project

In this project, students play the role of a restaurant owner who needs to develop and create a menu for his/her restaurant established in one of the target language countries of the world. Their menus must have at least five categories, and twenty-five items, all authentic dishes of the target culture of their choice within the Francophone world. They must decide on an appropriate name, create an address, phone number, website and twitter account name, consistent with examples they find on-line from authentic restaurants of the target culture. Their menu items must be priced in the local currency, converted in an appropriate manner for the target culture. The students then do a speech either in small groups or for the whole class in which they speak to the group as the restaurant owner, suggesting good dishes, specialty items, etc. They must say at least 15 sentences, and can either present live or on video. I have a rubric for the menu and one for the speech, and am looking for Stage 1 fluency, namely, formulaic language (memorized chunks of discourse combined with lists of works). I find that the kids learn a lot about a country of their choice, while having fun being creative!

Stage 2 Fluency Example: The Children's Story Book

We refer to stage two fluency as created language. The premise here is that students take the formulae that they have learned so well in stage one, and combine them together into their own created sentences. These statements no longer sound like memorized sound bites given back in the same formula, but rather in individualized, self directed expressions of thoughts and ideas. The sentences are frequently complex, but do not contain subordinate clauses of the kind requiring specialized verb forms. They also do not necessarily have to be strung together in a particular order to make sense - if we were to reorder them, they would make just as much sense in the new order. In other words, these are lists of sentences, but the order of the lists are not significant.

I have developed a project to measure this stage of fluency which I call the Story Book project. Students create a set of characters who live in one of the target language countries. They write the story as if the main character were describing his life when he was five years old (which requires the imperfect tense in French). The students then describe a big event which occurred in the life of the character, such as his first day of school, and then the things which happened in that day (requiring the use of the passé composé in French). They need to research what a child's life is like in the target culture and create an authentic and visually rich situation for the story's setting. I usually ask students to write about 5 sentences per page, and about ten pages total. They do rough drafts and peer editing. I also look at the drafts and highlight what is correct, and make some suggestions for corrections. The editing process is a learning experience of its own.

As students write their stories, they cannot help but compare their own lives with those of the characters they have created. The compare and contrast paradigme creates a good context for created language. It also allows students to try out their knowledge of how to narrate in past time frames, and demonstrate that they know how to use the various past tenses typical of the second year language curriculum. We often find that students reach what we call "linguistic breakdown" as they use various verb forms, but they do not necessarily do so at the syntactic level. They are able to make the sentence structures fit together well, even when their verb forms are not always correct. Frankly, I think this is great! When my focus is on the fluency stage, and not on distinct verb forms, I find that my students are actually progressing very well in their journey toward language acquisition. In time, they will perfect their use of verb forms, but in the meantime, they are clearly able to communicate at a higher level of fluency even if their accuracy is not yet up to par. We do want accuracy, of course, but in terms of fluency, this is a lesser problem for communication than is the sentence structure.

Stage 3 Fluency Example: The ABC Book Project

In stage three fluency, the text type I am aiming for is planned language, ie, paragraphing, in which there is a topic sentence, supported by concrete details and commentary, and a concluding sentence to sum up the important ideas. In French, this requires that students know how to create complex sentences, using main and subordinate clauses, requiring the subjunctive, or "if/then" type sentences, requiring imperfect/conditional tenses, among others (other languages may require knowledge of other paradigms as well). I have done this project over the course of a whole semester, breaking it down in smaller parts over time, and with the focus being Québec. We study many different aspects of Québécois culture: short stories, poems, song lyrics, historical texts, current events... The students do smaller projects along the way, but as a result of their inquiry, they write a page on each topic of their choice. I have them write 20 pages, one for each of 20 letters of the alphabet, according to their choice. An example page might look like this in English:

Q is for Québec City (title sentence). Québec is the capital city of the province of Quebec, and sits on a bluff overlooking the Saint Lawrence River (topic sentence). It seems to me that the people of Québec have much for which they may be proud (detail). It is necessary that they invest wisely in the maintenance of their historical monuments, because it preserves the diversity of their historical heritage (commentary). If I were to visit Québec, I would want to look out over the Saint Lawrence from the Terasse Dufferein so I could enjoy the beautiful view of the river and of the Ile d'Orléans (commentary). If I went to Québec in winter, I would go during the Carnaval so I could participate in the many activities (commentary). It is interesting that the local accent is different in Québec than in France. (commentary). If I go to Québec, I will practice speaking French with the local people and hope that I will be able to understand their accent without any problems (conclusion)."

This is a fair amount of work for one page, let alone twenty, so I provide a page template for students to use to be sure they keep on track. I have them do rough drafts of each page. When they turn in the drafts, I highlight what is correct and return the pages. The students may resubmit the pages with corrections until they have perfected their work. In this way, I am reinforcing their own editing process, and helping them to focus on the details they might otherwise overlook. This project has proven to be great fun, and I have found that by the end of the semester, they have mastered complex sentences and paragraphing quite well.

Future Plans

Next year, I plan to augment my project-based approach by connecting my classes with classes in 3 Francophone countries - France, Canada, and Sénégal. I want the students to collaborate with their peers across the world in writing digital stories which they will post on the web for their friends to read, and so they can offer comments and engage in conversations about the stories. I plan to have the students explore many story genres, including comic strips, manga, short stories and poems, and other kinds of writing as their interests are piqued. The many web 2.0 applications which are now available will be a big help in giving students the tools they need to write and create their stories. I expect the project to provide greater opportunities for engagement, creativity, problem solving, and collaboration ? ie, they will learn to communicate in French while learning 21st century skills!

Let's have some fun, too! Join the conversation. Post an idea on the Edutopia WL group. Need an idea? Got a question? Found a cool website, app or tool? Let's collaborate as well! Shall we get started? Thanks in advance for sharing your ideas ? together is better!

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Using Project-Based Learning to Teach World Languages

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Like other World Language teachers, I am constantly trying to focus on the essentials in order to create a standards-driven, communication-based curriculum for my students. I am also keen on addressing the necessary skills students must acquire for the 21st century as outlined in the wonderful document from the Carnegie Institute available at www.p21.org.