Audience & Goals

American Sign Language (ASL) proficiency consists of communicating through attending, videotext-reading, signing, fingerspelling, and applying culturally appropriate rules in real-life situations. The content standards are based on the American Council for Teachers of Foreign Language (ACTFL) proficiency levels. (These apply to all second languages including Spanish, French, German, and Japanese.)

Goals: To provide the student with knowledge of the target language, communication skills, and culture to allow him/her to participate effectively in the Deaf community.

1. Ask and answer simple questions related to basic needs.
2. Make statements in the present, past, or future tenses related to basic needs and common activities.
3. Participate in simple face-to-face conversations dealing with basic survival needs and minimum courtesy.

1. Demonstrate understanding of face-to-face encounters in familiar contexts.
2. Recognize words that signal differences between past, present, and future events.
3. Respond appropriately to short emergency warnings.
4. Recognize basic construction such as subject-verb agreement.

1. Use strategies such as predicting to interpret new words in familiar contexts.
2. Interpret and demonstrate understanding of short narrative stories on familiar topics.
3. Indentify the sequence of a simple narrative passage.
4. Interpret simplified narrative and descriptive passages on unfamiliar topics.

1. The student will begin to develop a basic vocabulary of ASL, demonstrated by mastering 250 signs.
   
   
2. The student will begin developing a knowledge of basic sentence structure in ASL, including simple statements, imperatives, and basic questions.
   
   
3. The student will develop an understanding of several principles and rules that govern ASL grammar (e.g., use of nonmanuals, classifiers, etc.).
   
   
4. The student will gain insight and perspective into Deaf culture and the Deaf community, where ASL is predominantly used.
   
   
5. The student will gain a better understanding of how to use the videotext and workbook, including a method to review, practice, and retain what he/she has learned.

1. The direct experience method will be used whenever possible. This means that the class will be taught in American Sign Language (ASL), without voiced English, and may include the following:
   
   1. creating and acting out common language situations,
   2. potential interaction with Deaf ASL users,
   3. signed dialogues between instructor and student,
   4. signed dialogues between videotext and student.
   
   
2. The instructor will demonstrate and model the use of ASL.
   
   
3. Videotapes (VISTA's Signing Naturally) may be used to demonstrate the use of ASL and/or provide information on Deaf culture.