Five children with severe educational retardation, aged 5-12, were involved in sign training in which the spoken words corresponding to signs were receptively known to participants. Whether signs were taught concurrently or in a serial fashion, signs taught by total communication were acquired faster than those taught by sign-alone training.…

Analysis of hearing-impaired adolescents' signed and written sentences expressing simple locative state relations found noun reversal and pragmatic focus errors in 7 percent of signed and 15 percent of written responses. Most errors were produced by profoundly hearing-impaired signers attending public day school. (Author/CB)

Presents results of a survey of sign language interpreter training and provision in European Community countries. The questionnaire addressed such areas as: language forms used by deaf people and interpreters; training funding and priorities; interpreter evaluation, registration, availability, and salaries; and societal acceptance of sign language…

The CIPP (Context Input Process Product) Evaluation Model is recommended for use in self-assessment of sign language programs. Five areas should be assessed: personnel selection, curriculum, student placement, media utilization, and supervision. For each area, a checklist is offered to determine whether existing goals and objectives require…

Twenty college students learned sign language vocabularly via an interactive videodisc system, while 20 control group students learned the same signs through a traditional classroom approach. The experimental group took one-third less time to learn as many signs as the control group. (Author/JDD)

This paper describes Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and its ramifications for sign language users, in particular, educational interpreters. Discussed are the syndrome's incidence, causes, diagnostic procedures, medical and surgical interventions, and prevention guidelines. (JDD)

Training procedures including cues-pause-point procedures were effectively used to teach two mentally retarded males (ages 18 and 20) to answer questions with sign language and generalize this training to correct responding to untrained questions. (Author/DB)

Spatial language in English and American Sign Language (ASL) was compared by asking 10 native signers and 10 English speakers to solve a set of spatial puzzles. The study highlights the ramifications of a linguistic system in which space itself is used to convey spatial information compared to one that conveys the same information via an auditory…

Reviews Thomas A. Sebeok's "Signs: An Introduction to Semiotics." This book teaches the reader to use terms like "sign,""icon,""index," and "symbol" with greater precision and effect. Sebeok's work spans more than three decades and strongly contributes to a number of related disciplines, especially…

Conventional sign language used by a community of signers over generations was compared with gestures invented by a deaf child over a period of years and with gestures invented by nonsigning hearing individuals on the spot. Findings suggest that an individual can introduce standards of well-formedness, but construction of standards requires…

This discussion examines the sociological implications of poor interactions in families in which a member is deaf. The paper recommends bringing hearing families together with the deaf community and using American Sign Language to facilitate functional symbolic interaction in hearing/deaf families. (Author/DB)

The accuracy of transliterated messages produced by sign language interpreters was studied. Causes of interpreter errors fell into three main categories: misperception of the source message, lack of recognition of source forms, and failure to identify a target language equivalent. (12 references) (Author/LB)

A survey of Australian teachers of the deaf and their classroom communicative practices found that many used speech with sign and most used Australasian Signed English, with most able to demonstrate that they could correctly encode the system. (six references) (Author/CB)

A six-year-old nonvocal girl with autism who had acquired a variety of signs and imitative responses consistently failed to acquire a tact (labeling) repertoire. When procedures to transfer stimulus control from verbal to nonverbal stimuli were implemented, the subject quickly learned to tact all 18 target stimuli. (Author/DB)

A language arts teacher of junior high students with deafness or hearing impairments familiarized her students with "Romeo and Juliet" by telling the story in speech and signs, exploring the characters's personalities, reviewing vocabulary, putting the characters into contemporary situations, and directing the students in a full-scale…