The Gift of Language Campaign

NAD February 2, 2018 in ASL 18 Subscribers Subscribe

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[Video description can be found below. If you use a screen reader and need to access the English caption file transcript, go to "More..." and click on "Transcript"]

Your deaf child can have it all! The NAD along with many national organizations and universities are here to support deaf children in receiving this gift. We are excited to launch the....

THE GIFT OF LANGUAGE CAMPAIGN!

That's right! We've got videos, a toolkit, infographics, and more resources for parents and families with a deaf child as well as community members. #giftoflanguage

EXPLORE: Link

VIDEO DESCRIPTION AND TRANSCRIPT: Video opens with a starry text intro revealing white cursive text "THE GIFT OF LANGUAGE".

Cut to floor view of toddlers and colorful shoes. Cut to over-the-shoulder shot of a child wearing a hearing aid looking on to an adult reading a book in front of the child. Cut to medium shot of a teacher working with a deaf child in a classroom while sitting on the floor. Cut to medium shot of four deaf children seated together at a table wearing kitchen chef hats, the teacher is cut out of frame and holding a bowl with a mixer. Cut to over-the-shoulder shot of an interpreter in a classroom as a deaf child looks on. Cut to close-up of a deaf child writing something on paper that is hung up. On-screen text in white appears: "YOUR DEAF CHILD CAN HAVE IT ALL!" White fade to over-the-shoulder shot of a deaf child sitting in a parent's lap while watching a teacher show something. On-screen text in white appears: "WHEN WE FIRST FOUND OUT..." Cut to parent interview clips.

PARENT: In the very beginning, we kind of hit the internet. There was just so much information. So many different people telling us -- well, not telling us specifically -- but saying that you should do things this way, you should do things that way.

PARENT: When she was around two and a half, she suddenly started acting differently. We assumed it was terrible twos or something like that. As clueless as we were that she wasn't paying attention, when it turned out she wasn't hearing... of course.

PARENT: I have two kids, both of whom were first born hearing. When my son lost his hearing at 18 months, we identified this early on and he was given hearing aids. I got different message like should start with spoken English first -- and hold sign language off -- That was what the medical communityâ€™s opinion was. For me as a deaf person, I believe in giving both languages both speech services and sign languages in both social and school environments.

PARENT: It was kind of a shock, it definitely was. And it was hard to think that he was going to be a normal child. But we definitely dove into educating ourselves about what that meant and what he was going to need and realized that it's just a different road that he was going to have to take to get to the same place to where he was going.

PARENT: When our older daughter Emma was identified as being deaf, that was almost 11 years ago. And I remember it like it was yesterday. We were in this tiny little hot room, and it was after the testing was done and the audiologist came in and I saw she was holding a pamphlet that said, 'My child is deaf... now what?' She sat down and she talked to us, and basically didn't give us a whole lot of information. They gave us some printed information, but didn't even mention the school for the deaf in the area.

PARENT: We would look at those things for examples, but when it came to the decision of what we wanted to do we felt like we really had to see what we felt was best for Aria.

PARENT: I remember feeling almost angry because we would read on the internet that we'd have to decide whether we were going to get hearing aids and an implant - a cochlear implant - and go the oral route. Or we were going to choose ASL as our only and primary means of communication and go that route. I felt uncomfortable with -- that can't just be the way it is. I want my child to have everything she can, physically and developmentally. If she's able to access English and she has the motor skills for ASL and the mental and developmental abilities to learn ASL and English, I wanted her to have everything. I didn't want to have to choose. So, I'm finding that we don't have to choose. We can teach her both English and ASL, and she can be exposed to both at school and at home. And it's not a hindrance to her, it's helping her.

Fade to black. On-screen white text appears: "YOUR DEAF CHILD CAN HAVE IT ALL". Fade to white. Gray soft background with black text appears: "WWW.NAD.ORG/GIFT-OF-LANGUAGE." Cut to several different font types showing "NAD" very quickly. Copyright video ends with the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) logo centered. Blue text below the logo appears, "The National Association of the Deaf / (copyright) 2018 All Rights Reserved / Link ". After a few beats, a yellow highlight appears with the URL.