Deaf Education in America: Voices of Children from Inclusion Settings

7. Voices of Deaf Children

59 All voices are valuable in understanding the complexities of deaf students’ experiences in integrated settings. For this reason, I interviewed deaf students, interpreters, deaf education teachers, and regular education teachers. In this and the following chapters, I have included all quotes relating to each specific category, as well as an interpretation of the emerging themes. Each participant created a new name for himself or herself. These names are used throughout the chapters so readers may follow the path of a single participant. It is important to note that not all students responded to each topic. The participants were allowed to guide the conversation and, therefore, were treated as conversational partners instead of objects of research. By asking probing questions aligned with the research questions, I was able to narrow the focus. Overall, it seemed that this approach was extremely effective, giving the participants more comfort in sharing liberally on topics that interested them. The deaf student participants range in age from 10 to 18 years, and they reside in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Ohio. All of them have hearing parents. They share a common experience of being educated in integrated classrooms that are located in larger suburban school districts. All deaf student participants also share the common experience of receiving an interpreted education through a sign language interpreter. At the time of the interviews three of the students were experiencing their first year at a school for the deaf, after spending years in integrated classrooms. Though all the students can communicate through ASL, two of them communicate in the integrated classroom through voice only, but they still use an interpreter to receive and to clarify information. As I analyzed the responses of the students, a dividing line seemed to emerge between the students that exhibit some ability to hear and speak and the students who are profoundly deaf and only communicate through sign language. This dividing line is so prevalent throughout this data that Voices of Deaf Children 7 Chapter Seven 60 I will refer to the first group as the signing deaf students (those students using only sign language to communicate) and the second group as the speaking deaf students (even though they may use signs to some extent). The participants in each group are listed below. Signing deaf students Speaking deaf students Zack Tyler Kyle Kaitlyn Jasmine Leslie Julie Patrick Ashley Sam It is important to note that these categorical references are based on the students’ preferred method of communicating, not on an enforced teaching philosophy. Also it is important to note that the speaking abilities of these speaking deaf students represent a wide range of intelligibility. Most of these speaking students vocalize with a “deaf voice,” which is markedly different from that of a hearing student’s voice. Also, all speaking deaf students know ASL and use it to some extent to communicate. Four of the student participants have cochlear implants. However, the experience of having a cochlear implant did not seem to directly lead to a common communication strategy or perspective. One of the students with a cochlear implant uses only signs to communicate, and therefore is considered in the deaf signing group, while the others are considered speaking deaf students. Table 7.1 provides further information about the student participants. Presentation of Themes From Deaf Student Interviews The students’ responses have been organized by topics: After each topic, an interpretive section discusses the themes emerging within these responses. The final interpretive section presents a collective discussion of the major themes found throughout the deaf student interviews. In the presentation of the themes, the responses have been organized in the following manner: general feelings about school, about interpreters, and about building relationships in a hearing school, as well as unexpected findings. Narrative Sketches of the Deaf Students Zack: Zack loves to play tag and tell jokes. Though he is profoundly deaf, he often chooses to not wear hearing aids. Instead, he prefers to be identified 61 Voices of Deaf Children with the deaf community and communicate solely through his native language of ASL. During the interview in his home, he seemed comfortable and relaxed but was anxious to resume his game of Nintendo. His mother shared that he had been placed in a deaf preschool program and then moved to an integrated school for first through fourth grade. This year, he chose to go back to the school for the deaf for...