Deaf Bilingual Education: a Comparison of the Academic Performance of Deaf Children of Deaf Parents and Deaf Children of Hearing Parents
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by IUScholarWorks DEAF BILINGUAL EDUCATION: A COMPARISON OF THE ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF DEAF CHILDREN OF DEAF PARENTS AND DEAF CHILDREN OF HEARING PARENTS Joseph David Geeslin, III Submitted to the faculty of the School of Education in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Education In the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies Indiana University May 2007 ACCEPTANCE PAGE Accepted by the Graduate Faculty, Indiana University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education. ____________________________________________ Khaula Murtadha, Ph.D., Chair Doctoral Committee ____________________________________________ Betty S. Poindexter, Ph.D. ____________________________________________ Robert Toutkoushian, Ph.D. ____________________________________________ Jenny L. Singleton, Ph.D. August 24, 2006 ii Copyright © 2007 Joseph D. Geeslin ALL RIGHTS RESERVED iii Dedication I dedicated this study to the memory of Laurent Clerc, the Deaf educator who commenced American Deaf education pedagogy. Clerc recognized the importance of partnering with the hearing community and led the way in describing how deaf children should learn. To this day, the mission continues to be to encourage native Deaf educators in taking the lead in making reforms for deaf and hard-of-hearing students in this country. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I could not have completed this work without the assistance and encouragement from my professors, Cohort V classmates, colleagues, family and friends. Particularly, I would like to express my gratitude to the following individuals: My deepest appreciation goes to my program and dissertation advisor, Dr. Khaula Murtadha, for guiding me throughout my doctoral studies. Without her enthusiastic guidance, my graduate studies at Indiana University would not have become a reality. I would also like to acknowledge the other members of my committee: Dr. Jenny Singleton, Dr. Betty Poindexter, and Dr. Robert Toutkoushian. The doctoral journey I embarked upon began with a seed planted by Dr. Brenda Schick when I was an sociolinguistics undergraduate student at Purdue University. Her continual encouragement of my pursuit of a degree was ongoing. When I met her at conferences, she would say, “Have you got your doctoral degree yet?” Dr. Donald Grushkin, a Gallaudet colleague, and I talked about the exciting phenomenon of bilingual deaf education and how we could share this with the rest of world. Holly Geeslin, my best friend and wife, has given unconditional support at home, at work and throughout my doctoral study. She listened to my endless discussion of new information I learned on this journey. She also shared her extraordinary experience as both an Audiologist and Speech Language Pathologist, which eventually influenced my understanding of how bilingual deaf education can celebrate both English and American Sign Language. Lastly, I give my true thanks is to the Deaf Community of Indiana. The Deaf community helped my hearing parents raise me to become who I am, particularly at the v Indiana School for the Deaf. In the late 1980’s, we had many discussions of what it means to be Deaf, how American Sign Language can be the language of instruction, and how we can partner hearing and deaf professionals to implement these practices. Many Deaf and hearing leaders took me under their wing to help me expand my Deaf experience and to develop insight into Deaf Education. Some of these leaders are: Laurene Simms, Louise Fitzpatrick, Diane Hazel-Jones, Eddy Laird, Cindy Lawrence, Stephen Nover, Ann Reifel, David Reynolds, Rachel Stone, Ann Titus, Jim Van Manen and Ronnie Wilbur. Thank you to my daughters Amelia and Morgan Geeslin for teaching me about the magic in children and bilingual language development. You helped me become the best father that I could to you both. Thank you to Holly for being my best friend and everlasting supporter. vi ABSTRACT This study examined the impact of the bilingual/bicultural deaf educational (ASL/English) philosophy on academic performance. The academic performance of deaf and hard-of-hearing students (N-182) was made available from the Indiana School for the Deaf (ISD) which has adopted a bilingual philosophy. It has long been known that deaf children of deaf parents have had superior academic performance when compared with deaf children of hearing parents (Israelite, et al, 1989; Strong & Prinz, 2000; Wilbur, 2000). One would then predict that the espousal of the bilingual philosophy should raise the academic performance of deaf children of hearing parents, placing them on par with deaf children of deaf parents. This study used the bilingual/ESL framework of Nover, et al (1998) to examine the effectiveness of the bilingual/bicultural philosophy used at the Indiana School for the Deaf. The performance of deaf and hard-of-hearing students from the 1995-1996 and 2002- 2003 school years was collected, including Reading Comprehension and Total Language subtests of the SAT-HI. A significant reduction was found in the gap between the academic performance of deaf children of deaf parents and deaf children of hearing parents during the 2002-2003 school year. The results suggest that a school, such as the Indiana School for the Deaf, may attempt to imitate the enriched home environment of deaf children of deaf parents in the educational setting. This allows the deaf community to shape the educational experience and optimize the advantages that deaf children of deaf parents have to open the doors of success to deaf children of hearing parents. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Title Page ………………………………………………………………….............. i Acceptance Page ...................................................................................................... ii Copyright…………………………………………………………………………. .. iii Dedication………………………………………………………………………….. iv Acknowledgements………………………………………………………………… v Abstract…………………………………………………………………………….. vii Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………... viii List of Tables………………………………………………………………………. xi List of Figures……………………………………………………………………….. xii CHAPTER Page 1 INTRODUCTION……………..................................................................... 1 Background to the Study.......................................................................... 1 Statement of Problems ............................................................................. 5 Definitions..............................................................................................6 Assumptions .......................................................................................... 10 Research Questions.................................................................................. 11 Implications ............................................................................................. 11 2 REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE..................................................... 13 History of Deaf Education....................................................................... 13 Deaf Children of Hearing Parent’s Academic Performance Gap ............ 18 Bilingualism .......................................................................................... 21 Stanford Achievement Test...................................................................... 35 Conclusion of Literature Review 2.......................................................... 36 3 METHODOLOGY AND DESIGN............................................................... 39 viii Subjects.................................................................................................... 40 Instrument ................................................................................................ 43 Rationale for selecting Indiana School for the Deaf................................ 45 Rationale for selecting 1996 & 2003 SAT-HI data ................................. 46 Design of the Study.................................................................................. 49 Procedures for Data Collection................................................................ 50 Plan of Data Analysis............................................................................... 50 4 RESULTS OF ANALYSIS OF DATA Demographics ................................................................................................ 59 Data Analysis ................................................................................................ 66 Research Question #1 results......................................................................... 66 Research Question #2 results......................................................................... 69 Research Question #3 results......................................................................... 72 Research Question #4 results......................................................................... 77 Multiple Regression Analysis............................................................……… 80 5 SUMMARIES and DISCUSSION Research Summary.................................................................................. 96 Discussion..………………………………………………………….….. 99 Limitations of the Study........................................................................... 103 Conclusions…………………………………………………………….. 105 Recommendations for Future Study........................................................ 109 REFERENCES .........................................................................................................