ASL

I'm writing this post from my iPhone. It's a first. I can't get my thoughts out as fast as I do when I'm typing on a keyboard with both hands, but I'm babysitting tonight so I figured this is as good a time as any.

For the month of February I took a beginners ASL (American Sign Language) class & absolutely fell in love. I've been intrigued with sign language for as long as I can remember, but especially for the past 6 years or so after the deaf/hard of hearing program took up residence at the school where I teach. They only stayed for a year or two, but I learned little bits and pieces back then & I wanted to know more! I would find myself getting carried away watching the interpreters as they signed & I'd forget that I had my own students to take care of. I remember random signs like.... shoes & socks. Not sure what good that's going to do me if I ever wanted to communicate with someone who was deaf. After this class, I am proud to say that I am fluent in the alphabet. I'll finger spell anything you can imagine. I also know ALL my numbers (up to the  billions- no joke), still a little rusty on months of the year and days of the week, but I could talk to you all day long about family members or foods!

 Learning happens best by teaching, so I always go back and teach my students at school everything I learned in my sign language class the night before. Most of them loved it. The ones who I thought wouldn't pick up on it very fast were some of the best signers. Interesting how it can be an alternate form of communication even for people who are not deaf. My very favorite thing from the whole ASL class was the video we watched at the end of a girl signing a song for her college level deaf education final exam. I'm going to post it the link on here, but be warned....if you are offended by language, don't watch it. If you can get past the language, its one of the most expressively signed songs I've ever seen. I'm working on learning the whole thing just for kicks. Lets just say, I can do the first 15 or so words or so.

Here it is... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sv3tadz5Q3o