Fingerspelling as a Bridge Between ASL and English Literacy

Introduction to Language Learning and Deafness

As children learn new languages, they are taught how to sound out words in order to write them correctly when the need arises. Language development in children traditionally follows a sequence: first experiencing the language, then listening to it, and finally viewing it in written form in order to fully understand what specific words represent. This process, however, is not possible for all children. Some children afflicted by deafness do not learn language through the traditional schooling methods that many other children use, and this is where the difficulty lies.

Traditionally, children are taught to associate the words they sound out with written words or text. This establishes a pattern of recognition that eventually translates into memory (Chamberlain, Morford, & Mayberry, 2000). This process cannot occur in the same way for deaf children. It becomes difficult to teach children who are deaf to read because of their inability to form the sound-to-vision perception on which language learning is typically based. The study conducted by Tamara S. Haptonstall-Nykaza and Brenda Schick (2007) tackled these very difficult issues. The researchers wanted to create a bridge between these two concepts and therefore expanded on the idea of fingerspelling as a way to give deaf children an easier path toward recognizing and writing the English language.

What Is Fingerspelling and Why Does It Matter?

Fingerspelling is a widely accepted form of language learning for deaf individuals. It consists of making specific hand gestures to represent the individual letters and sounds of the alphabet (Haptonstall-Nykaza & Schick, 2007). Rather than using standard American Sign Language (ASL), fingerspelling represents every individual letter in the alphabet. It is an ideal way for deaf children to first learn how to read and to form a connection between the visual and the auditory. The researchers in this experiment believed that in order for children to successfully understand written language and eventually write it themselves, they first need to master fingerspelling, which can then be used as a foundational tool to build upon.

The problem lies in the inability of the English language to correlate phonologically with American Sign Language. Establishing a connection between the two has been a difficult and daunting task (Valli, Lucas, Mulrooney, & Villanueva, 2011). Both languages have their own established rules that must be followed, and both require a significant degree of understanding in order to achieve full fluency.

Lexical Understanding and the ASL–English Connection

Lexical language entails a complete understanding of the underlying principles of a particular language. Lexicon is the internalized comprehension of a given language (Valli, Lucas, Mulrooney, & Villanueva, 2011). When individuals speak with one another, they share a basic understanding of the language being used. The underlying rules are already in place, and there is a mutual agreement — implicit among conversation partners — that allows communication to occur. Just as medical professionals can speak to one another without confusion in their specialized terminology, people in general can speak to and read the language of others because of these pre-established rules.

The connection between English and American Sign Language is not entirely clear, making it more difficult for deaf children to understand and express themselves. The researchers theorized that this is due to the inability of deaf children to maintain a "sound-to-print" connection (Haptonstall-Nykaza & Schick, 2007). They are unable to independently decipher the connections between the two languages.

Conclusion

Research in linguistics suggests that fingerspelling is an effective way for children to establish a connection between the English language and American Sign Language. The difficulty in teaching deaf children to read arises from the absence of a direct phonological link between what they see and what they cannot hear. Children who learn to read in the traditional sense do so largely because they can sound words out and hear what they see — a process that is far more difficult for deaf children who cannot make those same connections.

Haptonstall-Nykaza and Schick (2007) designed their experiment around this challenge and demonstrated that fingerspelling is an effective tool for providing a link between fingerspelled representations and printed English. Their findings support fingerspelling as a practical and accessible bridge for deaf children beginning to engage with written language, and they contribute meaningfully to ongoing efforts to improve literacy outcomes for deaf learners.

References

Chamberlain, C., Morford, J. P., & Mayberry, R. I. (2000). Language acquisition by eye. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 131–140.

Erting, C., Thumann-Prezioso, C., & Sonnenstrahl-Benedict, B. (2000). Bilingualism in deaf families: Fingerspelling in early childhood. In P. Spencer, C. Erting, & M. Marschark (Eds.), The deaf child in the family and at school (pp. 41–54). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Haptonstall-Nykaza, T. S., & Schick, B. (2007). The transition from fingerspelling to English print: Facilitating English decoding. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 12(2), 172–183.

Valli, C., Lucas, C., Mulrooney, K. J., & Villanueva, M. (2011). Linguistics of American Sign Language (5th ed.). Gallaudet University Press.