9. Application and Use of the Simplified Sign System with Persons with Disabilities

In Chapter 9, various approaches to teaching signs to non-speaking or minimally verbal persons are examined, including general exposure, an incidental or milieu approach, games and group activities, and specific training sessions. Learning goals are identified not only for the main or primary user of the system, but also for that person’s communication partners (family members, caregivers, friends) and persons in the wider environment. Guidelines for using the Simplified Sign System with the target populations are provided in order to establish good and consistent communication practices that will help to maximize users’ success with the system. Such guidelines or strategies include ensuring a positive signing environment, establishing visual contact, using key word signing, accepting errors in sign formation from the main user, rewarding progress, using facial expressions and environmental cues or contextual information to enhance vocabulary acquisition, and adapting the rate and frequency of signing. Finally, the authors anticipate and address many of the questions or concerns that teachers or caregivers may have as they embark on a program of using Simplified Signs.

8. Development of the Simplified Sign System

Chapter 8 provides background information on the development of the Simplified Sign System. These steps are included so that investigators may replicate research findings and/or develop additional signs for their own sign-intervention programs. The authors first discuss efforts to find highly iconic or representative gestures in the dictionaries of various sign languages and sign systems from around the world. If necessary, signs were then modified to make them easier to produce based on the results of prior studies of signing errors made by students with autism, the sign-learning children of Deaf parents, and undergraduate students unfamiliar with any sign language. These potential signs were then tested with different undergraduate students to determine whether the signs were sufficiently memorable and accurately formed. Signs that did not meet criterion were either dropped from the system or subsequently modified and re-tested. Initial results from comparison studies between Simplified Signs and ASL signs and between Simplified Signs and Amer-Ind signs are presented as well. Finally, feedback from users influenced the course of the project. Memory aids were developed, especially for those persons who have less familiarity with sign languages, to help explain the ties between each sign and its referent in case that relationship is not readily or immediately apparent to a potential learner.

4. Sign Communication in Persons with an Intellectual Disability or with Cerebral Palsy

In Chapter 4, the authors begin an in-depth discussion of the use of signs with special populations, including an early study that occurred in the West of England in the 1840s with deaf students with intellectual disabilities. Various types of intellectual disability are identified, including fragile X syndrome, Williams syndrome, Down syndrome, and Angelman syndrome. The successes and failures of speech-based and sign-based interventions are covered for individuals with these syndromes (particularly the latter two) as well as in persons with multiple disabilities. The authors next move on to a discussion of the relatively sparse research related to teaching signs to children who have cerebral palsy. Recommendations for enhancing the sign-learning environment are provided so that all persons who use signs as an augmentative or alternative means of communication may derive the greatest benefit from their communicative interactions. In addition to maximizing the positive atmosphere in which signing individuals interact with others at school, at home, and in public, the authors suggest that the types of signs employed may also have an impact on whether or not signing is successful.

3. Deaf Persons and Sign Languages

Chapter 3 introduces the reader to various aspects of sign languages, including their historical development and use within educational contexts by Deaf communities in Europe and the United States. Also covered is the initiation of the field of sign language linguistics by William C. Stokoe, a linguist who systematically proved that American Sign Language (ASL) was indeed a language with its own distinct structure and properties that differed from any spoken language. The phonological parameters of signs receive considerable attention, highlighting ways in which the unique properties of sign languages allow them to represent meaning in ways that are more consistently transparent and iconic than similar phenomena in the speech modality. Despite these similarities across sign languages, the differences among the sign languages of the world led Deaf persons to create and develop the lingua franca of International Sign (previously Gestuno) for use at international conventions. Finally, the similarities and distinctions between the processes of language development and acquisition across the modalities of speech and sign are discussed, as well as how signing benefits the learning of spoken language vocabulary by hearing children.

1. Introduction

Chapter 1 provides an introduction to the language and communication needs of various individuals who have difficulty expressing themselves either through speech and/or by using one of the full and genuine sign languages of Deaf people. The authors propose the integration of the Simplified Sign System, a manual sign-communication system that is comprised of iconic and easily formed signs, into the environments of persons with various communication difficulties, including individuals with autism, aphasia, intellectual disability, or cerebral palsy. Various misconceptions about sign training are tackled and countered by information highlighting the benefits of sign usage for many different people. The authors then present the principles on which their sign system is based, including iconicity, ease of production, the relatively broad conceptual base of many signs, the standardization of the signs, and the provision of a core vocabulary. These principles also make them easier to learn and remember by other potential users of the system, including international travellers, parents adopting children from other countries, elderly persons who have developed hearing impairments, foreign language instructors, and students learning an additional spoken language.

5. Childhood Autism and Sign Communication

Chapter 5 provides a comprehensive, historical overview of the defining characteristics of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) along with the various language therapies employed to improve the communicative success of minimally verbal individuals. The various strengths and weaknesses of such approaches are analyzed as a basis for helping to determine which methods are likely to be the most successful. The history of signing in persons with ASD is examined, with a special focus on the relatively recent realization that motor skills (both gross and fine) and imitation abilities in such individuals may be severely impaired, thus limiting the effectiveness of sign interventions that do not take into consideration the motor complexity of the signs used. Since many parents and caregivers may also express reluctance to adopt a strategy that uses signs out of fear that this will prevent their child’s acquisition of speech, research dispelling this myth is provided. In addition to coverage of sign-communication interventions and strategies for promoting spontaneous communication and generalization of sign use to multiple settings, other non-oral approaches employed with persons with disabilities are presented as options, including the use of real objects, the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS), Blissymbols, speech-generating devices, and software applications.

7. Use of Manual Signs and Gestures by Hearing Persons

In Chapter 7, the authors change focus from the use of signs by deaf persons and with individuals with disabilities to how signing may enhance the learning and processing of spoken language by typically developing hearing children and adults. The first topic examined is the use of signs to foster infants’ and young children’s acquisition of their principal spoken language. Signs may further serve as an effective intervention strategy in academic settings for children with ADHD or as a means to improving vocabulary acquisition and reading comprehension for children who lag behind their age group on various language performance measures. Iconic signs and representative gestures may also be used to facilitate the acquisition of foreign language vocabulary when the signs are paired with the to-be-learned words. Finally, various studies concerning the positive benefits of learning to sign promote the possibility that using the visual-gestural modality may confer increased skills in various cognitive domains such as spatial memory, mental rotation, and facial discrimination.