Deaf Sign Language Teachers Have a Standard Like the CERF and a Are Native Signers and Learned to Sign Be- Platform to Exchange Our Views/ Fore Their Fourth Birthday

Sign Language Teaching In Europe Report & Recommendations

Editor Liesbeth Pyfers

Published by European Union of the Deaf (EUD) Brussels Belgium ISBN 978-2-9601505-4-4 Date September 2017

Project number KA2 2014-1-NL01-KA200-001279

Duration September 2014– August 2017

Website www.signteach.eu

Copyright Pragma, Hoensbroek NL All requests concerning the reproduction or translation of all or part of this document should be addressed to Pragma, [email protected]. Photos © UCLan, pages 112, 119, 121 © L.Pyfers, all other photos

The SignTeach Project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. 3

Table of Contents

Foreword ...... 4 0. Summary ...... 6 1. Introduction ...... 8 2. Sign Language: Everything you’ve always wanted to ask…...... 12 3. SignTeach: the Project ...... 17 4. SignTeach: the Survey ...... 20 5. Country Reports ...... 26 5.1 Belgium ...... 27 5.2 Czech Republic...... 42 5.3 Germany ...... 53 5.4 Iceland ...... 69 5.5 Italy ...... 80 5.6 the Netherlands ...... 90 5.7 Norway...... 101 5.8 United Kingdom ...... 108 6. Conclusions & Recommendations ...... 126 SignTeach Consortium ...... 131

TOC 4

Foreword by Markku Jokinen As the President awareness of the need for such research of the European to reinforce the importance for the pro- Union of the Deaf fessionalisation of jobs revolving around (EUD), I am de- sign language teaching. The work com- lighted at the opportunity to introduce pleted in this book is essential, as to this publication to you. compare the results from the partici- This is probably the first book that focus- pating countries and to analyse, or even es on sign language teaching on a Euro- one step further, opinions expressed by pean level, through bringing many teach- various experts as done in these pages, ing experts from various European coun- will bring the profession of sign language tries together in partnership to gather teaching one step further. experience and materials, which formu- I am confident that many users will find lates the basis of this book. various uses of this book and that it can This field is not unfamiliar to me, indeed, serve as a useful tool for all stakeholders I have researched this field in depth dur- at all levels, whether at the EU level or ing my studies at the University of Roch- on a national level. But, more important- ester (postgraduate work in Linguistics, ly, a tool that we wished to have earlier, a Psycholinguistics, and Sign Language Lin- tool which will be the working basis for guistics). In addition to this, I am current- the next generation of sign language ly working on a national level doing advo- teachers. cacy work as Director of the Finnish Asso- ciation of the Deaf, together with the Dr. Markku Jokinen, President, European Finnish authorities we are working on Union of the Deaf (EUD) the ‘Language Policy Programme of Na- 29 September 2017 tional Sign Languages in Finland’. I am very aware of the importance of car- rying out research such as the work completed in this book. The key is raising 5 6

0. Summary

This report is one of the outputs of For each country, you will find a short the SignTeach project, a European pro- historical overview, some infor- ject funded under Erasmus+. SignTeach mation about the training of sign lan- was a project for and by sign language guage teachers, accreditation, and teachers. It was a 3-year project that more. We included short interviews with started in September 2014. experts from each of these 8 countries. In this report, you will find some back- For each country also: some results of ground information about the Sign- the SignTeach Survey. More results and Teach project (Chapter 3) and the Sign- interviews can be found on the Sign- Teach Survey (Chapter 4). Teach website. You are reading this publication, so In the final and most important chap- you are interested in sign language. ter of this report, Chapter 6, you will Maybe you are a sign language user, a find our conclusions recommendations. sign language teacher, or a sign language For 3 years, SignTeach partners met bi- interpreter. However, we hope that annually to develop new resources for many people with little or no previous colleagues in Europe, but also to discuss experience with sign languages will read current and future barriers that sign lan- this publication too. For them, we in- guage teachers and sign language learn- cluded Chapter 2 with everything you’ve ers have to deal with, not just in our always wanted to ask about sign lan- countries, but across Europe. And may- guage. be globally. Although sign languages are generally recognized as a valued and vi- The main part of this publication are the tal element of European culture, they country reports (Chapter 5) with cur- are in need of support and protection. rent information about sign language By whom, and how? This you can read in teaching and the training of sign lan- Chapter 6. guage teachers in the 8 European countries that participated in the SignTeach project. In alphabetical order: Belgium, the Czech Republic, Germany, Iceland, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, and the UK. 0 7 8

1. Introduction Frankie Picron and David Hay, EUD, language and to give sign language an summarized chapters of this report in official status. International Sign. You can access Recently, November 2016, the European the online signed summaries by clicking Parliament adopted a resolution on Sign on the David‘s picture; or click here for Languages and professional Sign Lan- the online version of this report. guage Interpreters (2016/2952(RSP). It The sign languages of the EU are recog- includes (item 24) a call on the Member nised as fully fledged indigenouslan- States "to encourage the learning of sign guages of the European Union (Leeson, language in the same way as foreign lan- 2006) and are an important part of guages." Europe's multilingual diversity. For deaf sign language users to be able to work and learn in their preferred language - a sign language - professional sign language teachers are needed to teach sign language to parents of deaf children (most parents of deaf children are hearing, with no previous knowledge of sign language), other fam- It is estimated that there are approxi- ily members, friends, teachers, col- mately 750.000 deaf sign language users leagues, as well as for the training of in the EU (Sign Language Legislation in professional sign language interpreters. the European Union, 2012); the total The SignTeach project number of sign language users In 2014, 11 organisations from 8 Europe- (including hearing people) is several an countries joined forces to develop an times larger. Open Educational Resource for sign lan- In order to ensure that deaf people guage teachers: the SignTeach website are able to work and learn in their pre- (www.signteach.eu). The project was ferred language, the European Commis- funded under the Erasmus+ Programme sion, in concert with the European Par- (KA2 2014-1-NL01-KA200-001279). liament, has taken steps to promote sign

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Objectives than as a profession and a viable career option. Many sign language teach- One of the objectives of the SignTeach ers work on their own, without or with project was to find out more about sign only occasional contacts with other sign language teachers and sign language language teachers. teaching in Europe. At the start of the project there was little or no collabora- In this report, you can find some of tion between sign language teachers the results of the Survey and the inter- across borders, or even nationally. It views that we had with experts. On the was—and still —is unknown how many SignTeach website, you will find more sign language teachers there are in each information as well as videos of sign lan- country, who they are, how they are guage teachers at work trained, and how and where they work. (www.signteach.eu). What are their wishes? What are the New developments barriers that they have to deal with? Since the start of the SignTeach pro- What are good practices that they want ject in 2014, there have been some to share with their colleagues? promising developments, for instance, The SignTeach Survey the international Lesico conferences for The SignTeach Survey - an online survey sign language teachers and the recently published in written English and Interna- established European Network of Sign tional Sign - tried to find answers to Language Teachers (www.enslt.eu). these questions. At the same time, we see major Results threats. Although we do not have hard data to support this, most experts who What we found was not encourag- we consulted agree that fewer and few- ing. Many sign language teachers have er people learn sign language as a first had little or no formal or even informal language. Without native signers, sign training for teaching a sign language. languages are at risk of soon being Teachers report that they develop 50% taught as ’dead’ or extinct languages, or more of the materials that they like Latin. use, themselves. In some countries, sign language teaching is considered more And in the longer term, of not be- like a hobby or voluntary work, rather ing used and taught at all?

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Overview (UK). In the next chapter, you will find We compared the data of these 8 coun- some background information about tries with the average data of all coun- sign languages, and what YOU can do to tries. We interviewed experts in support sign languages and sign lan- these countries and asked them for their guage users. In later chapters, you will viewpoints and recommendations. find results of the SignTeach Survey and Main conclusion the interviews that we had with experts In this introduction, we can already in the countries of the SignTeach part- tell you the main conclusion of the Sign- ners. Teach project and the SignTeach Sur- Although the Survey was completed vey: much, much more needs to be done by over 240 sign language teachers - at local, regional, national and Europe- from across Europe, unfortunately, we an level - to support sign languages and did not have sufficient data for sophisti- sign language teaching. cated statistical analyses, for instance to Conclusions & Recommendations compare countries or subgroups. In a way, this report ends with a ‘cliff For this report, we focused on the coun- hanger’: What is going to happen, next? tries of the SignTeach partners. In alphabetical order: Belgium (BE), the This, we cannot tell you. In the final Czech Republic (CZ), Germany (DE), Ice- chapter, Chapter 6, we WILL tell land (IS), Italy (IT), the Netherlands (NL), you what we WANT to happen: our Norway (NO) and the United Kingdom conclusions and recommendations.

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2. Sign Language: Everything you’ve always wanted to ask ...

Sign language? Hearing people often say: “Wouldn’t it be much easier, if all sign language users Sign language, is that a real language? used the same sign language?” Yes. Actually, it is not one language, but many. Each country has its own national Well, yes. Then again, it would be even sign language and in some countries, more efficient if all hearing people more than one sign language. worldwide would use the same spoken Only deaf people use sign language. Better yet: if everyone, hearing and deaf, would use the same sign language? language! But no, we don’t expect that No. Sign languages originated in com- that is going to happen anytime soon. munities of deaf people, but now proba- Who learns sign language? bly more hearing than deaf people learn or use a sign language. Some reports Many people do. Children who are born state that American Sign language is in families where sign language is used, now the fourth most taught second lan- learn sign language naturally, in the guage in the USA. same way that hearing children acquire the spoken language of their parents. Who invented sign language? Relatives, friends, colleagues of deaf No one did. Sign languages are natural sign language users often learn to sign. languages that originated in communi- People may learn to sign for their job, ties of deaf people, centuries ago. Sign for instance to work as a sign language languages evolve, change over time, interpreter. In some countries, sign lan- have regional dialects, and subgroups of guage can be learned in secondary sign language users develop their own schools and at universities, as a second sign vocabularies. But these changes language. happen as a natural process, in the Learning a sign language is different and same way that spoken languages evolve. exciting: you learn to express yourself Is sign language universal, is it an without using your voice. Instead, you international language? use your hands, face and body. 2 13

Who teaches sign language? For many deaf people, a visual sign language is the only language that is 100% In the past, sign language, or a form of accessible. This means that sign languages ‘sign supported speech’ was taught by are not only the preferred language of hearing people, often the clergy. In the most deaf people, they also constitute a second half of the last century, deaf peo- ‘reasonable accommodation’ that makes ple claimed their language and started to it possible for deaf people to realize their teach sign language, themselves. Most of human rights — civil, political, economic, them however had not been trained as a social, cultural—and to participate on an teacher; in most countries, each teacher equal basis in society (United Nations developed his/her own materials and Convention on the Rights of Persons with curriculum. Disabilities, 2006). In some countries this has changed in recent years, and sign language is again Are sign languages endangered taught by hearing teachers. One of the languages? objectives of the SignTeach project and Again yes and no. In many countries, the this report was to find out more about number of people who learn a sign lan- these changes. guage as a first language is shrinking. No, Can you compare sign languages because in many countries, the number to spoken minority languages? of people who learn a sign language as a second language is growing. However, Yes and no. Yes, because sign language without a sufficient number of native users are a minority in each country. No, signers, sign languages are at risk of ex- because most minority languages are a tinction. majority language in some country or re- According to Ethnologue (www.ethno- gion. The only place where sign language logue.com) most European sign lan- users are in the majority is within the guages are ’developing’ languages (status Deaf Community. 5), which means “The language is in vig- Another important difference: most sign orous use, with literature in a standard- language users did not, and in many cases ized form being used by some though do not, acquire sign language from parent this is not yet widespread or sustaina- -to-child but from peer-to-peer interac- ble.” Yet in some European countries, for tion, or by explicit instruction. instance in Iceland, sign language has the status of ‘threatened’: “The language is 2 14

used for face-to-face communication EU policymakers within all generations, but it is losing us- Please read this report. Find out more ers.” From ’developing’ language to about sign language users and sign lan- ’threatened’, or vice versa? guage teaching in your country. Actively Would it be so terrible if sign support EU and national actions to pro- languages become extinct? mote and support sign language users, sign language teaching. Yes, for several reasons. Sign language teachers and their • It is always a bad thing, when a language trainers is no longer used. It is especially bad in Please read this report. Use the infor- the case of sign languages, because sign mation in this report and on the website languages represent a different ‘species’ to become a better, more professional of languages with very special charac- sign language teacher. Learn from the teristics that are worth preserving. good examples. Use this report and the • Yes, because sign languages are the only SignTeach website as a launching pad for languages that deaf children can acquire national and transnational collaboration. naturally, without intervention. Sign language users Please read this report. Be proud to be a • And yes, because without sign languages, sign language user. Be a role model for deaf people are not only deprived of other sign language users. Know that, their language, but also of their culture without sign language users like you, sign and for many: their identities. And, last languages are at risk of extinction. but not least: of the ‘reasonable accommodation’ that enables them to realize their human rights and to Our message? participate on an equal basis in European sign languages are an inaliena- mainstream society. ble part of Europe’s heritage, culture, and society. In many countries, sign lan- What can you do? guages are endangered languages and Everyone at risk of extinction. Please read this report. Please forward it We – all of us - must do everything we to colleagues, policymakers, everyone can to promote and support sign lan- you know, to help us disseminate our guages, sign language users, sign lan- message. guage teachers.

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www.eud.eu, DECEMBER 2016

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3. SignTeach: the Project

The project Transnational consortium meetings were always interesting and stimulating. The official name of the SignTeach pro- Many of the photos in this report were ject is: Sign Language Teachers in Eu- taken at these meetings. rope: an Open Educational Resource. It was an EU project funded under the Good examples Erasmus+ Programme (project number: The original plan had been to interview KA2 2014-1-NL01-KA200-001279). sign language teachers and sign lan- SignTeach was a 3 year project, the guage students. This plan was immedi- starting date was September 2014. ately rejected at the kick-off meeting. Consortium Too static, not visual enough. Our target group wants to SEE what we want to tell The consortium consisted of 11 organi- them. So partners recorded what we sations from 8 European countries. You call “Good Examples”: short videos of can find the names of the partners sign language teachers interacting with on page 13 of this report and on the 1 different learner groups. To make the Sign-Teach website. videos more accessible, we added intro- Most of the participants are members ductions in International Sign and the of the project’s target group: deaf sign national sign language of the teacher in language teachers. the video.

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To give more background information, we Podcasts also added Comment videos. During the Last but not least, partners produced 40 lifetime of the project, 40 Good Examples video “podcasts”: short presentations in were produced and posted on the web- International Sign with information that site. they want to share with colleagues across Resources the EU. We collected information about the sign Website, Facebook languages of Europe, about relevant or- This report is the final output of the Sign- ganisations, funding options, materials. Teach project. Partners will remain ac- Teacher Skills tive, follow-up projects are being We discussed “Teacher Skills”: what are planned. You can find all information on the skills that a sign language teacher the website, needs? Together, we selected 4 * 7 skills, www.signteach.eu and produced videos to describe these. and on our Facebook page: www.facebook.com/signteach/

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4. SignTeach: the Survey

Who to ask? experts in this field. In some countries, there ARE competing factions or parties. To find out more about sign language WHO we’d consult would determine teachers and sign language teaching in WHAT they’d tell us about their country. Europe we wanted to collect quantitative and qualitative data from all countries in Online Survey Europe. So we decided for a grassroots approach. We surfed the net and consulted our net- We would ask the sign language teachers works, but in many countries sign lan- themselves. We developed an online sur- guage teachers are not organized. There vey for sign language teachers in Europe. is no register of sign language teachers, The survey could not be too long, What and in many countries, not even a na- were the most important questions to tional organisation of sign language ask? teachers. When we found sites for or by Questions had to be relevant and easy to sign language teachers, the information understand for sign language teachers was usually only available in the national across Europe. sign language and/or national written Most questions would have to be multi- language. Even with Google’s help, these ple choice questions, because many sign sites rarely answered the many questions language teachers are not able to write that we had. in English and even with the help of We asked the European Union of the Google translate it would be difficult for Deaf to help. “Can you please ask all your us to deal with answers in many different members to provide us with the infor- languages. mation that we want?” The members of The questions had to be about the per- the EUD are national Deaf Organisations sonal experiences of the sign language – and the EUD told us that most of these teachers themselves, because each have little or nothing to do with sign lan- teacher is an expert when it concerns guage teaching. his/her own situation. We tried to find 2 or 3 experts in each Ultimately, we agreed on 3 major topics country to consult. But in many coun- and 22 questions. tries, there are no generally recognized 4 21

Three topics Over 240 responses The three main topics are: Early 2017, we had almost 275 respons- 1. Information about the respondents. es. Some were by people who were not Are they deaf or hearing? How old? sign language teachers. We excluded How many years of experience? their answers from the analysis. Some 2. Information about their work. Who do were from sign language teachers out- they teach? At what level? How many side of Europe. It was good to see that hours per month? What materials do sign language teachers from countries as they use? far away and as diverse as the US, South 3. Information about their training. Korea, Liberia, Australia and Chile took What training had they had? What the trouble to answer our questions, but were their wishes, for further train- we did not include their responses in our ing? analysis. Ultimately (May 2017), 243 sign language teachers from across Europe had completed the Survey. Enough to get an overall impression of similarities and differences, but not enough for sophisticated statistical analyses. For this report, we focused on the eight countries of the SignTeach partners. In alphabetical order: Belgium, the Czech Republic, Germany, Iceland, Italy, the International Sign Netherlands, Norway and the UK. We The questions were signed in national compared the data of these countries Sign by David Hay (EUD) and published in with the ‘average’ data of all countries. English and International Sign on the Representative? SignTeach website, August 2015. We A considerable number, 243 responses, used our networks, social media, confer- but the main target group of the Sign- ences and personal contacts to get as Teach project proved very difficult to many sign language teachers from across reach. Most sign language teachers in Eu- Europe to answer the questions of the rope do not read and write English. For Survey. 4 22

international communication, deaf sign view of the situation in their country and language teachers who completed the with interviews with experts. For the Survey say they prefer International Sign eight countries represented in the con- to English. sortium. you will therefore find more elaborate descriptions in this report. To reach the majority of sign language teachers, however, we should have pre- Main conclusions of the Survey sented the Survey questions in the national sign languages of our target group. 1. There are major differences between Unfortunately, we did not have the re- countries, but also within countries; sources to do this. 2. In many countries, the majority of the respondents say that they are very As a result, the Survey was mostly com- much in need of more training, more pleted by sign language teachers with materials, more support and more na- many international contacts and/or tional and international collaboration. working in academic settings. Sign lan- 3. Respondents appreciate the Sign- guage teachers who work independently, Teach initiative and website, but many in adult education programmes or in in- indicate that they need (much) more: formal settings are probably under- more information, more information represented in the Survey. in their national sign language, more Country Reports contacts with other sign language Consortium partners supplemented the teachers, as well as answers to some- Survey data with a short historical over- times very specific questions.

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Results SignTeach Survey: Europe Number of respondents: 243 respondents, from 23 European countries.

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Hearing Status Who do you teach, most of the time? 83% of the respondents are deaf, 15% are The largest group of learners are hearing hearing, with major differences between adults. In all age-groups, deaf learners countries. In some countries, 100% of the (blue line) are a minority. respondents are deaf, in the Netherlands, 53% of the respondents are hearing. Open question: Good advice? “More attention for teaching deaf children (and their family), they are the future and they have no-one to teach them sign language! Especially not in these times of integration.” “I hope that more and more sign language teachers receive a good education Native signers? and state certification. I would like to Most of the deaf sign language teachers have a standard like the CERF and a are native signers and learned to sign be- platform to exchange our views/ fore their fourth birthday. Over 40% of experiences.” the hearing respondents however, Open question: Barriers? learned to sign after age 20. “Everything: very little support, few deaf people (one year ago a new deaf colleague at my work, but we have too much work so we hardly can work together), no platform with other deaf teachers (all too busy and systems that are too different), hearing environment, hearing education (learning hearing di- How many hours do you teach, per month? dactic methods), didactic and material for For most respondents, sign language spoken languages,…” teaching is not a full-time job. More results on www.signteach.eu 4 25 26 27

Country Report 5.1 Belgium 28

5.1 Belgium—Flanders

Myriam Vermeerbergen & Kristof de Weerdt, KU Leuven (BE)

Flanders to develop and promote a signed system called ‘Nederlands met Gebaren’ (‘Dutch Flanders is situated in the northern part with Signs’) or NmG. It was assumed that of Belgium and its most common spoken NmG could function as a bridge between language is Dutch, whereas in Wallonia, sign language users and speakers of the southern part of Belgium, mostly Dutch. From 1981 a number of initiatives French is used. In the past, there was on- were taken to promote the use of NmG, ly one Belgian Deaf Federation, NAVEKA- e.g. the organisation of the so-called DOS (the ‘National Federation of Catholic ‘vrije gebarencursussen’ (‘free communi- Deaf–Mutes’). However, in the 1970s, as cation courses’) for hearing people and a result of the political process of feder- the founding of an ‘interpreters for the alization in Belgium, the national federa- deaf training programme’ to train inter- tion was divided up into Fevlado preters to work between Dutch and (Federatie van Vlaamse Dovenorganisa- NmG. (Boonen, Van Herreweghe, & Ver- ties) (the ‘Association of Flemish Deaf Or- meerbergen, 2004). Most of the teachers ganisations’) and the Fédération Franco- teaching NmG were deaf, and they had phone des Sourds de Belgique (FFSB). had no training. Since then contacts between Flemish and Walloon deaf people have become less In the early 1990s, Fevlado established a and less frequent and the sign language (small-scale) teacher training programme varieties used in both communities di- and in 1993, as part of a European Hori- verged. zon project 16 young deaf teachers attended courses, mainly on language In 2000, Fevlado decided on the official teaching methodology and didactics. name for the sign language used in Flan- Within the framework of this programme ders, Belgium: Vlaamse Gebarentaal the participants travelled to the Centre (‘Flemish Sign Language’ or VGT). The for Deaf Studies in Bristol where Clark Flemish Deaf Community consists of Denmark offered an intensive course in about 5000-6000 people (Loots et al., Sign Language Teaching Methods. In part 2003). due to his charismatic influence, some of History the participants started to doubt the use- At the end of the 1970s, Fevlado decided fulness of NmG and wanted to change 5.1 BE 29

their own teaching towards Flemish Sign VSPW in Ghent. Language. This, together with some oth- Ghent University offers an elective er developments (see Boonen, Van course ‘Introduction to Flemish Sign Lan- Herreweghe, & Vermeerbergen, 2004), guage’ (4 ECTS) and at the University led to Fevlado officially rejecting the use Language Centre of the same university of ‘Nederlands met Gebaren’ in favour of there also is a VGT course (30 hours). Flemish Sign Language. Around 1996, At KU Leuven Campus Antwerp, the only both within the ‘vrije gebarencursussen’ Flemish academic training for sign lan- and interpreter training, classes in NmG guage interpreters is organized. At this were replaced by classes in Flemish Sign university, Flemish Sign Language is inte- Language (VGT). This was not easy, as grated in the Bachelor of Applied research on Flemish Sign Language Lan-guage Studies Pogramme (3 grammar was still in its infancy and in- year-programme), the Master in formation on the linguistics of VGT was Interpreting (1 year) and there also is a very scarce. specific part-time one year Courses Postgraduate in VGT Inter-preting. Flemish Sign Language courses for hear- Training of SL teachers ing adults (who want to learn VGT as L2) Today, more than 20 years after the start are offered by Fevlado-Diversus (level 1 of teaching Flemish Sign Language as an and 2; each level consisting of 20 classes L2 to hearing people, there still is no of 2 hours each) and several CVOs specific formal training for teachers of (‘centres for continuing education’). We Flemish Sign Language. know of at least seven CVOs where VGT classes are offered. Some deaf schools Ever since it was decided to teach Flem- also offer VGT courses for hearing par- ish Sign Language instead of ‘Nederlands ents and other family members of their met Gebaren’, Fevlado has taken initia- deaf students. However, this is very tives to support and train its own teach- much ‘ad hoc’ and limited. ers. In 1996 for example, a course on the grammar of Flemish Sign Language was VGT is also taught as part of the two part organized for deaf teachers. Today, Fe- -time training programmes for sign lan- vlado offers teachers who start teaching guage interpreters organized by the CVO Flemish Sign Language level 1 a 12– half- Crescendo in Mechelen and the CVO days training and teachers who begin to 5.1 BE 30

teach VGT level 2 a six half-days training, collaboration with a linguist studying the mainly concentrating on the grammar of grammar of Flemish Sign Language. VGT, on didactics and on the content of Since then, Fevlado has regularly updat- the course materials. ed and complemented its materials, col- In the past, two deaf native signers laborating e.g. with the Vlaams trained to become what used to be GebarentaalCentrum (‘Flemish Sign Lan- called a ‘regent’ (i.e. a teacher in year 1 guage Centre’) and/or the CVO VSPW in to 4 of secondary education) and one of Ghent. their three subjects was Flemish Sign Most other programmes/individual Language. There are a few other deaf teachers develop their own materials, teachers who hold a degree related to although there also is (mostly informal) education, e.g. they trained to become a collaboration and exchange of materials. nursery school teacher or primary The CEFR certainly is a source of inspira- school teacher. Some other deaf teach- tion for some of the teachers (e.g. at KU ers (again very few) obtained a so-called Leuven) but it is not formally/struc- getuigschrift pedagogische bekwaam- turally implemented. heid (‘certificate of pedagogical compe- Number of SL-teachers tence’). The total number of VGT teachers is esti- Some hearing teachers combine a sign mated at 30 to 35 people. language interpreting training with a (general) teachers training (‘specifieke This year (2016-2017) some 18 deaf lerarenopleiding’) and as such they may signers teach the Fevlado-Diversus be seen as trained/qualified to teach courses. The number of teachers teach- Flemish Sign Language but as said, there ing Flemish Sign Language in a centre for is no specific training for those who continuing education (CVO) is estimated want to become professional teachers of at 12 to 15, some deaf, some hearing. At Flemish Sign Language. KU Leuven, there are two (deaf) teach- Curricula, learning materials, ers of Flemish Sign Language. The two part-time interpreter training pro- CEFR grammes currently employ 2 deaf VGT The first materials to teach Flemish Sign teachers each. The number of people Language were developed by Fevlado at teaching VGT for parents or staff mem- the end of the 1990s. This was done in bers at deaf schools is unknown. Some 5.1 BE 31

teachers are affiliated with more than (lexicographical research). one programme/initiative. Sign language legislation There is no association of Flemish Sign th On April 26 2006, the Flemish Parlia- Language teachers. However, there is a ment unanimously approved a decree working group consisting of 4 deaf recognizing VGT as the language of the teachers (2 working for Fevlado- linguistic-cultural minority group of deaf Diversus, 2 affiliated with KU Leuven, people and Flemish Sign Language users Campus Antwerpen). So far, the group in Flanders. The decree further regulat- has organized two workshops for deaf ed the establishment of an advisory Flemish Sign Language teachers (one in committee for VGT, and funding mecha- 2014 and one in 2016). nisms for projects related to VGT. Sign language research An important question Research on the grammar of Flemish Especially because there is no specific Sign Language started around 1990. The training for teachers of Flemish Sign Lan- first books reporting on research results guage, the question of what is the ‘ideal’ were published in the second half of the profile of the VGT teacher is a complex 1990s (Vermeerbergen, 1997 and Van one. One of the questions is whether or Herreweghe 1995). In 1999 the Vlaams not preference should be given to deaf GebarentaalCentrum published a teachers. “signing book”, i.e. two video-cassettes with information on the grammar of Around 2010 more and more CVOs start- VGT explained in VGT. The first (online) ed offering Flemish Sign Language cours- dictionary was published in 2004. It is es. They sometimes employed hearing currently being expanded by the Vlaams teachers, most often sign language inter- GebarentaalCentrum. preters who only recently learned Flem- ish Sign Language as an L2 themselves. In Flemish Sign Language clearly is one of March 2012, out of concern about the the un(der)documented signed lan- quality of VGT-teaching Fevlado and the guages, mainly because there are very Vlaams GebarentaalCentrum wrote an few active researchers. Today, research advice arguing against hearing late- activities are situated at KU Leuven, learners of VGT teaching Flemish Sign Campus Antwerp; at Ghent University Language and in favor of deaf teachers. and the Vlaams GebarentaalCentrum

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Currently, the Adviescommissie Vlaamse Gebarentaal (‘advisory committee for 1) excellent sign language proficiency, VGT’, www.adviesvgt.be) is working on 2) linguistic knowledge, its own advice, again out of concern about the quality of Flemish Sign Lan- 3) pedagogical knowledge and guage courses. This advice is not yet fi- 4) frequent contact with the sign lan- nalized but it seems that the issue of guage community. whether or not VGT should be taught by deaf teachers is not seen as all that important. Instead, the advice follows De References: Weerdt, Salonen and Liikamaa (2016) in https://www.signteach.eu/ stating that a sign language teacher index.php/book/references needs:

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Interview with Myriam Vermeerbergen Prof. dr. Myriam Vermeerbergen is a sign linguist and a sign language interpreter trainer at KU Leuven, Faculty of Arts, Antwerp (Belgium).

Myriam Vermeer- Flemish Sign Language in another train- bergen is the chair ing course or program (e.g. sign language of the Flemish Sign Language group and interpreter training) and additionally ob- coordinator of the Master in Interpreting tained some sort of teacher’s degree, but program of the KU Leuven in Antwerp. not one specifically for Flemish Sign Lan- In the early 1990s Myriam pioneered lin- guage. I don’t mean to say that those guistic research on Flemish Sign Lan- people aren’t good teachers, but their guage (VGT) and founded the very first training is not specific enough. Also, academic Flemish Sign Language course. most of these people are hearing late- She is co-founder and former president learners of Flemish Sign Language. of the Vlaams GebarentaalCentrum Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ (Flemish Sign Language Centre), recog- in your country? nised by the government as the centre of This is a difficult one. I am very happy to expertise for Flemish Sign Language. Be- see that most teachers and most institu- tween 2008 and 2016, she was also a tions offering Flemish Sign Language member of the Advisory Board on Flem- teaching realise that Flemish Sign Lan- ish Sign Language. guage teachers need a proper and specific training program. Also, some teach- What, in your opinion, are the strengths/ ers really put in a lot of effort to try and weaknesses of the current system in your get as much training and information as country? possible. I am pleased, and proud, to say The most significant problem is the lack that my colleagues at KU Leuven are of a specific training program for Flemish among these highly motivated profes- Sign Language teachers. Most of the sionals. teachers have had no or very little train- I also very much like the collaboration being. Today the people who in theory are tween different initiatives, institutions best trained to teach Flemish Sign Lan- and organisations, e.g. when developing guage, are those who learned/studied teaching materials and exchanging ideas. 5.1 BE 35

And last but not least, we now have the seeing that I had created materials for Corpus Vlaamse Gebarentaal, which can our own course at the VUB. be used both for research and for teach- Subsequent teaching materials were ing. often developed as a collaborative effort, Can you tell us about the accreditation of involving e.g. the Vlaams Gebarentaal- sign language teachers, in your country? Centrum, Fevlado (and Fevlado- There is no accreditation of sign language Diversus), and the CVO (centre for con- teachers in Flanders. tinuing education) VSPW in Ghent. Can you tell us something about curriculum With regard to the CEFR, I assume you development in your country? Are curricula could say that some aspects of the based on the CEFR? framework influenced the development The first materials that were developed of curricula but I wouldn’t say that most were aimed at teaching Nederlands met curricula are “CEFR-based”. Gebaren (Signed Dutch) and not Flemish What, in your opinion, is the way forward Sign Language (VGT). for sign language teaching & the training of In 1992-1993, whilst working on my PhD, sign language teachers in your country, and/ I developed and delivered an elective or in Europe? Flemish Sign Language course at the Vrije Without any doubt: high quality training Universiteit Brussel (VUB) (24 hours/ for sign language teachers. And this year) which was taught by a deaf friend. training should be fully accessible for The materials we created for this course deaf students. were inspired by my experiences teaching Dutch as a foreign language. I would like to see a ‘Flemish Sign Lan- guage course’ as an optional subject for Towards the end of the 1990s, the status everyone in secondary education, or of Flemish Sign Language was changing maybe even an introduction to Flemish and NmG courses were being trans- Sign Language for all primary school kids. formed into VGT courses. This was very I think that would be nice and it might difficult in the beginning, as there were lead to young people wanting to do very few materials to teach VGT. Fevlado, something more with what they’ve al- the Flemish Deaf Association, took the ready learned. initiative to develop a first set of materials and asked me to coordinate that task,

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Do you have any recommendations that you want to share with us? The grammar of Flemish Sign Language still is under-documented and under- described. As such, it is very important that the teaching “keeps up works”, so to speak. What I mean is that whenever new research results on the linguistics of VGT are available, these should immedi- ately be incorporated in Flemish Sign Language teaching (materials). And because of this, it is even more important that there is a close collaboration between researchers, those who provide teacher training, and those who do the actual teaching. Research should inform teaching but it is also the case that teaching may “feed” research, i.e. questions that come up when teaching the language, may be and should be addressed by sign language linguists.

Date of the Interview: May 2017

On the SignTeach website: a video of a conversation between Myriam Vermeer- bergen and her colleague Mieke Van Herreweghe on these and other topics related to Flemish Sign Language teaching.

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Interview with Hilde Nyffels Fevlado-Diversus; VSPW

continuing education, where students Hilde Nyffels has a are required to take an exam at the end wide experience in of each course. But there also exist more teaching. She informal, smaller-scale courses, organ- started teaching ised by Fevlado-Diversus. These are open Nederlands met Gebaren (‘Signed Dutch’) to anyone who is interested in wanting to in 1994, but for over 20 years now, she learn (about) Flemish Sign Language and has been teaching Flemish Sign Language Deaf culture and there are no exams or (Vlaamse Gebarentaal or VGT). Currently, tests. I feel it is really good to have differ- she combines two jobs: she works for Fe- ent types of courses, different opportuni- vlado-Diversus (the Flemish Deaf Associ- ties. Some people simply want an intro- ation) where she is responsible (among duction to Flemish Sign Language and other things) for training and supporting Deaf culture, nothing too extensive or deaf Flemish Sign Language teachers and formal. for the development of teaching materi- What is lacking in Flanders are tailor- als. She also works for the VSPW (a CVO, made courses and training: Flemish Sign i.e. a centre for continuing education), Language courses targeting specific where she teaches Flemish Sign Lan- groups, such as healthcare professionals guage courses. Hilde has always strongly (e.g. nurses, geriatric assistants ...), civil invested in her own continuing education servants (receptionists, administrative and professional development – and con- clerks - people who often get in touch tinues to do so. with the public, police officers too) … In What, in your opinion, are the strengths / my opinion such courses could be organ- weaknesses of the current system in your ised by centres for continuing education country? (CVOs). In Flanders, there are different options Unfortunately, in Flanders there is no rec- for (hearing) adults who want to learn ognised training program for Flemish Flemish Sign Language. There are the Sign Language teachers. Consequently, more extensive, formal courses, for ex- VGT teachers are not qualified and I real- ample those organised at centres for ly feel that is a significant shortcoming in Flanders. 5.1 BE 38

What I consider to be an additional or degree related to teaching. strength is that we really try hard to en- Those teaching for Fevlado-Diversus re- gage deaf signers to teach Flemish Sign ceive a basic training on the grammar of Language, in spite of the fact that they VGT and didactics. On completion of the have no qualifications. training, they get a certificate as proof of Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ attendance. in your country? I myself enrolled in a teacher training Not really, but as I said, I very much like program at a centre for continuing edu- the fact that Flemish Sign Language is cation and obtained the ‘certificate of mostly taught by deaf (native) signers. pedagogical competence’. I also took Can you tell us about the accreditation of courses in sign language linguistics and sign language teachers, in your country? the linguistics of Flemish Sign Language at KU Leuven in Antwerp. All that was As I mentioned earlier, there is no spe- very enriching, yet I still feel something is cific training program for sign language missing, something at a higher level. teachers in Flanders, therefore, accreditation is not possible. Can you tell us something about curriculum development in your country? Are curricula Some teachers (especially those teaching based on the CEFR? at a CVO) do hold some certification. They obtained for example a getuig- At the moment we do not work with the schrift pedagogische bekwaamheid (‘a CEFR at the CVO where I am employed. certificate of pedagogical competence’). However, several teachers went abroad They attended such training to gain more (e.g. to attend conferences such as Lesico insight into didactics. …) and we realise it would be good to de- Others took courses in sign language linguistics and/or the grammar of VGT in order to learn more about VGT as a language. There are also a few deaf teachers who trained to become nursery school teachers or primary school teachers. But the majority of the Flemish Sign Lan- guage teachers do not have a certificate

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velop course materials based on the el. Students should be offered exchange CEFR. We should try and integrate the programs in order to teach or to gain ex- CEFR into the existing curriculum. This is perience abroad and to exchange ideas. not straightforward, because it involves a It is also important that teacher’s training lot of work and the team doesn’t really programs (at colleges, universities) do have the time to meet up on a regular not only provide courses on didactics and basis. Most teachers do not work at the VGT, but also introduce students to CVO full-time. They combine a part-time different groups within the Deaf commu- position as a teacher with another job, nity, such as senior citizens, deaf-blind which makes it hard to find opportunities people, etc. For those who would like to for them to get together. really focus on one particular target What, in your opinion, is the way forward group, specific modules should be organ- for sign language teaching & the training of ised. This should also be included in in- sign language teachers in your country, and/ terpreter training programs. or in Europe? 2. When it comes to offering Flemish Sign 1. In Flanders, there are a number of uni- Language courses for adult learners, this versity colleges and universities that pro- is my suggestion: vide teacher training programs. Students A vrije gebarencursus (or ‘open sign lan- can decide what kind of teacher they guage course’) for everyone who is inter- would like to become, e.g. a Dutch and ested in learning about VGT as a lan- English teacher. Depending on their qual- guage and about Deaf culture, and for ification, a teacher is allowed to teach in family members (e.g. aunts, uncles, etc.) a primary school, secondary school or in of deaf children, or senior citizens ... This tertiary education. The programs that ex- type of (informal) course can be organ- ist today do not include opportunities for ised at a centre for continuing education Flemish Sign Language teachers. (CVO) and also by Fevlado-Diversus. It would be good if there would be at However, the teachers should be trained least one university college or university at a higher level. They must have that would offer a program for VGT knowledge of didactics, VGT and Deaf teachers, in accordance with the pro- culture. Teachers must therefore have a gram for Dutch teachers. There should be bachelor’s degree or a specific degree for a program at BA level and one at MA lev- teaching VGT in adult education.

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A (more formal) course at a higher level order to ensure that teaching levels are should be taught at a CVO or at universi- standardised across Flanders. This is not ty colleges. The target audience of these the case today, as different institutions courses would be hearing people who interpret the curricula in different ways. might come into contact with deaf peo- Do you have any recommendations that you ple, e.g. caregivers, civil servants, par- want to share with us? ents, deafened people who would like to Perhaps in the future there could be one learn VGT ... These courses should be Master program for European deaf taught only by teachers who hold a BA or teachers. This could be taught in EuSL, MA degree, i.e. (highly) qualified VGT- like ASL is used in the United States of teachers. America. This is my dream for Europe. A sign language interpreter’s training program has to be organised at a university (MA-level) and not at a centre for contin- Date of the Interview: May 2017 uing education. CVOs should instead focus on organising more customised VGT On the SignTeach website: video of a con- courses, e.g. aimed at people working in versation between Hilde Nyffels and Geert health care (see also above). Profession- Verstraete on these and other topics related als working in the social domain are qual- to Flemish Sign Language teaching. ified within their own field of expertise, but lack proper communication skills with deaf or deaf-blind people. In order to be allowed to teach Flemish Sign Lan- guage at a university level, teachers need to have obtained a MA degree. 3. There is a need for a centrally developed curriculum or rather curricula for different levels (as I mentioned earlier) and different target groups, based on the CEFR. Subsequently, course materials need to be developed for these different levels and groups. It would be ideal if an external body could take care of this in 5.1 BE 41 Results of the SignTeach Survey: Belgium

Number of respondents Imagine: you can make three wishes for your 21 respondents from Belgium. work as a teacher. What do you wish for? Age of the respondents

The most important wish for the sign language teachers from Belgium: more con- Compared to all sign language teachers tacts with other sign language teachers. who completed the Survey, the respond- Many also want an e-learning platform ents from Belgium are relative old: 50% for sign language teaching. are 41 years or older; 35% are 51 years or older. Open question: advice, good examples? Have you had any special training for teach- “Each country should have an organisa- ing sign language? tion for sign language teachers.” “I think it is very positive that there is now a website for sign language teachers. We can learn a lot from it, and we can use it to share experiences.” Open question: barriers? “Work by deaf teachers is often not taken Only 45% of the respondents from Bel- seriously. “ gium (orange) have had any special train- “A barrier is that the students are difficult ing , compared to 82% for all respondents to understand, and also that they need to (blue). We did not ask any details about hear a voice when they don't understand the training; this can vary from a single me or my lessons.” workshop, to a 4 year academic training More results can be found on the SignTeach programme. website.

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Country Report 5.2 Czech Republic 43

5.2 Czech Republic

Radka Nováková & Vladimír Šimon, Pevnost, Prague (CZ)

General background In the early 1990s, the only institution opening new approaches towards deaf- Czech Sign Language (CzSL or in ness and towards the deaf as a linguistic Czech: ČZJ) has been used for centuries and cultural minority (and thus initi- but was recognized as a language in ating the interest of linguistics) was the 1998. Federace rodičů a přátel sluchově pos “Czech linguistics started focusing on lan- (žených (Federation of Parents and guages and communication of the Friends of the Hearing-Impaired) and its deaf only in mid-1990. Deafness was (in (now defunct) counterpart, the Institut the former Czechoslovak Socialist Repub- pro neslyšících (Institute for the lic and in the subsequent Czechoslovak Deaf).” (Richterová, Macurová and No- Federal Republic) in the hands of medi- váková 2016: 164-165). cine, special pedagogy and logopaedia. Sign language research Even in the Czech Republic (established in 1993), deafness was often ap- proached (and, sadly, sometimes is even today) as a deficiency, a defect which may be cured, remedied, removed. The official attitude of the Communist re- gime, prior to 1989, was strictly uniform and dominated by what has been called the "demutisation" of the deaf, that is, the endeavour to teach the deaf to talk and to lip-read (if not hear) at the very The first papers on communication of the least. Czech Deaf was published in 1994 by If the opinion that human beings can de- prof. Alena Macurová (see photo) as the velop a complex system of communica- first Czech linguist. She focused her tion not based on sound existed at all, efforts on fathoming the structure and it was strictly a minority belief before functioning of the CzSL, compared it with 1989. other national sign languages etc.

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In 1998 the Deaf Studies program was launched in a three-year Bachelor´s De- gree form and a five-year Master’s De- gree form in combination with the Czech Language and Literature, with the Insti- tute of Czech Language and Theory of Communication standing guarantee at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University in Prague. Czech is being taught. In 2004 a two-year follow-up Master’s Pevnost – the Czech Centre of Sign Lan- Degree program was launched (not in guage (Pevnost) was founded in 2000 combination with Czech Language and and is lead by deaf people themselves. Literature). Pevnost provides high quality sign lan- In 2013 (November 1st) the Institute of guage courses not only for hearing peo- Deaf Studies was established (splitting off ple (7 levels; each level consisting of 35 from the Institute of Czech Language and classes of 2 hours each), but also for sign Theory of Communication). It is the only language interpreters and for other tar- department pursuing the linguistics of get groups (such as hearing parents of sign languages and the Deaf Studies in deaf children, police officers, doctors the Czech Republic. etc.) Courses The Institute of Deaf Studies, Charles University in Prague teaches CzSL as aca- CzSL courses for L2 hearing people are demic training for students who want to offered by several organisations for the become a sign language interpreter or a deaf (also by some hearing organisa- teacher in a school for the Deaf. tions). These courses are taught not only by deaf teachers, but also by hearing Some universities in the Czech Republic teachers (mostly CODA, Children of Deaf also offer an elective CzSL course for Adults). their students (mostly Faculty of pedagogy). Unfortunately, the quality of courses in our country varies greatly. The courses Training of sign language teachers are often presented as Czech Sign Lan- There is no specific formal program for guage courses, but in reality, Signed 5.2 CZ 45

teaching sign language at university level Curricula, learning materials, CEFR in the Czech Republic. Most organisations/individual teachers However, the Institute of Deaf Studies, develop their own materials for teaching Faculty of Arts, Charles University, teach- sign language. Unfortunately, there is no es the Linguistics of Sign Languages collaboration and exchange of materials. (primarily Czech Sign Language), and the There is no CEFR for Czech Sign Language training and education of the Deaf. So, therefore these materials are not adap- deaf students may be seen as trained/ tion to the CEFR. qualified to teach CzSL. Number of sign language teachers Some organisations offer training for their teachers of CzSL. Over ten years There is no official association of CzSL ago, Pevnost organized several training teachers which has some sort of registra- courses for deaf teachers of CzSL. After tion. We estimate that the total number passing the exam, the deaf teachers re- of CzSL teachers is between 40 to 60 ceived only a certificate. people. In 2012, the Institute of Deaf Studies pro- The first meeting of deaf teachers and vided a one-year training course for 11 CzSL teachers organized by Pevnost in deaf sign language users who wanted to 2016 was attended by only 42 CzSL become sign language teachers, in a Life- teachers from across the Czech Republic long Learning Programme. (see photo). However, there are more teachers who

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are employed by the schools for the Unfortunately, the Czech Sign Language Deaf, some by universities, some by or- dictionaries were not developed on the ganisations for the Deaf while others are basis of a corpus of Czech Sign Language. self-employed. Sign language legislation At the second meeting of Deaf Teachers Act on 'Sign System' (Zákon o znakové and Sign Language Teachers (April 2017) řeči) was ratified on 11th of June 1998, it was decided to establish an associa- after a lot of hard work. The act was ap- tion; a working group was elected to re- proved as a symbolic recognition of the alise this. Czech Sign Language as the primary form Sign language dictionaries of communication of the deaf in the There are only two general sign language Czech Republic. dictionaries in the Czech Republic. The However there was a problem with the first dictionary Slovník znakové řeči was old term “znaková řeč” (sometimes published in 1988, in the former Czecho- translated also as “Sign Speech” or “Sign slovak Socialist Republic by Gabrielová, System”), which includes both Czech Sign Paur and Zeman. It was known as the Language and Sign Supported Czech “blue book”. The second two dictionaries (Signed Czech). called Všeobecný slovník českého znako- The Act on the Communication Systems vého jazyka A-N and Všeobecný slovník of Deaf and Deafblind persons (novela: českého znakového jazyka O-Ž were pub- Zákon o komunikačních systémech lished in 2002 by Potměšil. neslyšících a hluchoslepých osob) was adopted by Parliament (June 2008) and came into force in October 2008. The old term “znaková řeč” was removed. Czech Sign Language and communication systems based on the Czech language are now clearly distinguished.

References: https://www.signteach.eu/index.php/ book/references

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Interview with Marie Basovníková

Deaf teacher of Czech Sign Language at a secondary school for the Deaf. Leader for developing the methodological material and methodical support for the subject of the Czech Sign Language at primary schools for the Deaf. Poet and performer/artist of Czech Sign Language.

What, in your opinion, are the strengths/ University. I like it because it was as a weaknesses of the current system in your neutral and independent place where all country? Deaf people in the Czech Republic can For the strengths in our country, there get a proper training course, rather than are the positive views on Czech Sign Lan- in a “private” organisation. guage and on Deaf people as members Can you tell us about the accreditation of of a linguistic cultural minority. sign language teachers, in your country? Is Until 2000, the only courses that were the system as accessible deaf teachers, as taught were Signed Czech, all by hearing for hearing teachers? teachers (mostly children of deaf par- We do not have any formal accreditation ents). Now I see that almost all teachers of sign language teachers in our country, are Deaf, teaching Czech Sign Language. not even as an academic degree, that is On the other hand, there are no systems specifically for the training sign language for the standardisation of the curriculum, teachers. or to monitor the quality of teaching sign There are some the short-term language. “informal” training course provided by Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ organisations themselves for their poten- in your country? tial candidates, who after passing an exam can work for this organisation. One good example is that a few years ago there was the one-year training In my opinion, this does not work well course for Deaf people who wanted to and is more like an internal training that become sign language teachers, as part the organisation has set up for its own of the Lifelong Learning Programme by business. A formal and “open” training the Institute of Deaf Studies at Charles programme for all – this is still missing in the Czech Republic.

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As to the second question about hearing have to struggle with that. Because I do teachers – in our country there are only a not know what and how to teach proper- few hearing teachers who teach Czech ly. It is a big challenge for me. Sign Language. I support them only if What, in your opinion, is the way forward they work together with Deaf teachers in for sign language teaching & the training of the advanced courses of CzSL for sign sign language teachers in your country, and/ language interpreters. However, general or in Europe? Czech Sign Language should be taught by My biggest wish is to develop and to ap- Deaf native signers. prove a CEFR for Czech Sign Language as Can you tell us something about curriculum soon as possible. It is a key to all systems development in your country? Are curricula – it would give us a tool for organisations based on the CEFR? to keep the proper level of teaching sign We do not have any CEFR for Czech Sign language. Language. Each organisation develops its The second question, the way forward for own curriculum based on their teaching good quality sign language teaching, is to methodology and also based on the re- enable more sign language teachers to quirements from the Ministry for Educa- participate in the Lifelong Learning train- tion/Social Affairs that organises the ac- ing programme for sign language teach- creditation courses. Unfortunately, their ers. requirements are mostly inadequate and inconvenient. I see two very big problems. Date of the Interview: May 2017 First, there are major differences in the levels of teaching sign language, between organisations. Second, the development of the curriculum is focused more on teaching sign language to hearing adults, not to teaching it to deaf/hard of hearing students at the School for the Deaf. In my case, I work as a teacher of Czech Sign Language for deaf and hard of hearing students – I

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Interview with Radka Nováková Deaf, native signer of Czech Sign Language. Asisstant Professor, the Institute of Deaf Studies, the Faculty of Arts of Charles University in Prague. Chief operating officer of Pevnost– the Czech Centre of Sign Language in Pra- gue. Editor of the News in Czech Sign Language, Czech Television.

What, in your opinion, are the strengths/ professionals could exchange not only weaknesses of the current system in your their teaching experiences, but also news country? from the academic field of research on In my opinion, there are more weakness- sign languages and the teaching of sign es than strengths in the Czech Republic. languages and finally, it was a unique op- An example of a weakness: there is no portunity to make new contacts in this standardised system for teaching sign field. At the end of the conference, there language or the training of sign language were two more important events. First, teachers. Organisations providing CzSL the conference participants decided that courses and also freelance sign language a LESICO conference with the same name teachers often see each other as com- will be held every two years. petitors, fighting for the same students Secondly, the proposal was approved to or jobs. set up a professional organisation: The strengths, on the other hand: I see the European Network of Sign Language that Czech deaf people are more self- Teachers (ENSLT) that would unite deaf confident; they are more aware of the sign language teachers together in its value of their sign language. They speak goal, as it is in Europe. out that the CzSL courses should be led Second, the Institute of Deaf Studies is an by deaf native signers. associate partner in two European pro- Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ jects: Sign languages and the Common in your country? European Framework of References for I can give you two examples. First, Languages. Descriptors and approaches Pevnost organised the First international to assessment (ProSign) carried out in Conference of Sign Language Teachers in the ECML’s 2012–2015 programme, history – LESICO in 2013, in Prague. The and Promoting Excellence in Sign lan- LESICO Conference was a place where guage instruction (ProSign2) carried out

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in the ECML’s 2016–2019 programme. the subject of Czech Sign Language at The Institute translated the brochure Sign kindergarten, primary and secondary Languages and the Common European schools for the Deaf. The National Insti- Framework of Reference for Languages tute for Education (NÚV) run directly by Common Reference Level Descriptors into the Ministry of Education Youth and Czech Language. Sports in cooperation with deaf teachers Can you tell us about the accreditation of (lead by Marie Basovníková) has started sign language teachers, in your country? Is to develop methodological materials and the system as accessible Deaf teachers, as methodical support for deaf teachers of for hearing teachers? Czech Sign Language. This project will There is no regular BA or MA programme run from January 2017 to December for sign language teachers in the Czech 2021. Republic. Deaf students who graduate What, in your opinion, is the way forward from the Institute of Deaf Studies, are for sign language teaching & the training of able to become sign language teachers. sign language teachers in your country, and/ But this does not work well because or in Europe? there are no clear qualifications for In my opinion, to begin to improve the teachers of different target groups. Most quality of sign language teachers, we of the teachers know how to teach hear- need to do many things in our country: ing adults, but they do not know how to • Establish a professional association of teach deaf children at school etc. CzSL teachers; There are informal short-term training • Develop a CEFR for CzSL; courses for sign language teachers, orga- • Cooperate with ENSLT; nized by many organisations. Unfortu- • Exchange information and share expe- nately, we don’t have a central registra- riences with sign language teachers, tion system of qualified teachers; there is both nationally and internationally, no quality control of independent sign • Encourage sign language teachers to language teachers. Anyone who wants, participate in various seminars and can teach sign language in the Czech Re- training workshops in Europe or to public. study available open educational re- Can you tell us something about curriculum sources for Sign Language Teachers development in your country? Are curricula (for example: www.signteach.eu). based on the CEFR? I can tell you about one project related to Date of the Interview: May 2017 5.2 CZ 52 Results SignTeach Survey: Czech Republic

Number of respondents 60% of the Czech respondents teach less 16 respondents. than 21 hours per month. Hearing Status Imagine: you can make 3 wishes for your work as a teacher. What do you wish for?

Most of the Czech respondents are deaf (green), 6% are hard of hearing, None of the respondents is hearing. Almost all respondents wish for more Age groups learning materials. Many also wish for a sign language curriculum. Open question: Good advice? “I think that it is good to attend the conferences, e.g. LESICO conference, and lectures connected to sign language teaching or didactics, and to study more. Per- haps it is also good to share experiences, Most of the Czech respondents are be- opinions and examples on websites not tween 31-40 years of age, relatively only from my country, but also from Eu- young compared to their EU colleagues.. rope.” How many hours do you teach, per month? Open question:Barriers ? “No co-operation with lecturers from other cities; everyone is doing it his way. Here in the Czech Republic there is not a unified system of signs.” More results can be found on the SignTeach website.

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Country Report 5.3 Germany 54

5.3 Germany Sabine Fries, Hochschule Magdeburg-Stendal FH, Magdeburg (DE)

Historical background bring home friends, we understand nothing. We would like to learn how to Long before there was reliable sign.” (Wloka 2001: 227 – our transla- knowledge about DGS and sign language tion). research in Germany, signing courses (“Gebärdenkurse“) existed. Until the end Apart from teachers of the deaf and of the 1980s, hearing participants of hearing children of deaf parents, most of such courses learned a form of “Signed whom also worked as interpreters at the German”, now referred to as “Laut- time, there were a few deaf people with sprachbegleitendes Gebärden” (LBG, good oral skills who also taught such signs accompanying speech), that is, they "Gebärdenkurse". learned how to speak and more or less Completing an LBG course went some consistently use manual signs at the way towards enabling hearing learners to same time. communicate more or less successfully LBG: “Signed German” with deaf people, provided that the content of the conversation did not go be- Teachers of these courses were often yond the scope of everyday subjects. hearing children of deaf parents. A long- time teacher of such classes was However, Signed German did not allow Manfred Wloka, teacher and later head- for relaxed and fluent communication, in master of the Deaf School in what was particular because hearing learners could then West-Berlin. As the son of deaf par- not follow the silent and spontaneous ents he had grown up with sign lan- communication that is usual among deaf guage. Looking back, he remembers the people. beginnings of his activities: The Blue Book “The impetus for my first sign language In terms of teaching materials, signing course in the autumn of 1976 came from classes almost exclusively relied on the parents of deaf children who kept saying few collections of signs available at the over and over again: “We are completely time, such as the dictionary of signs gen- helpless, we stand outside the communi- erally known as the “Blue Book”, a collec- ty of deaf people, and when our children tion of signs published in 1977 by teach-

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ers of the deaf Hellmuth Starcke und their courses to hearing participants as Günter Maisch. Their volume was widely learners of a foreign language. Exercises used in the years after its publication, un- in nonverbal communication, a visually- til it came to be increasingly criticized for oriented curriculum focusing on sign lan- the inclusion of many “international” guage grammar, facial expressions, man- signs alien to the German Deaf commu- ual parameters, and spatial dimensions nity and eventually replaced. became central. Grass-root By the end of the 1980s, more and more deaf sign language teachers became active. The development was actively supported by the “Bundesarbeits-gemein- schaft für Gebärdenkursleiter (BAG)”, an association of sign language teachers founded in 1987. This grass-root movement was highly motivated by the growing awareness of sign languages as true languages spread- ing all through Europe by this time1. Deaf people actively involved in this empowerment wave had a lasting influence on the character of "Gebärdenkurse". DGS: Deutsche Gebärdensprache Instead of earlier LBG courses, which were designed to teach hearing people Mary Philips advising the first DGS-teachers in Berlin how to accompany their spoken language by manual signs in order to communicate with or, rather, talk to deaf Sign language units such as classifiers, people, deaf teachers now addressed verb modifiers, and locations were the

For a personal account of these developments by one the important Deaf activists of the time see Gertrud Mally on “The long road to self-confidence of the Deaf in Germany”, in Renate Fischer and Harlan Lane, Looking Back: A Reader on the History of Deaf Communities and their Sign Languages (Hamburg: Signum, 1993), pp. 177–198. 5.3 DE 56

new focus of attention. These new courses came to be a great attraction to hearing learners. In the learners‘ minds, the awareness grew that they were facing a fascinating language of its own that provided access to a vibrant culture, not just a set of manual cues to be used as an aid to facilitate communication with a group of disabled people. Deaf sign language teachers However, the Deaf community was not adequately prepared for the great interest hearing people took in learning this new language. The growing demand for DGS courses raised many questions and at times caused considerable problems. Robinson and Freitag teaching DGS in a German TV program. As in the 1970s in the USA, sign language Pioneering sign language teachers did courses in Germany were increasingly not have access to teaching concepts and taught by Deaf people who were happy teaching materials. The BAG was on the to teach and often embraced this as a lookout for training materials and invited challenge and a vocation, but often they Deaf lecturers such as Gilbert C. Eastman did not know enough about the language (USA), Frances Elton (UK), Christa Ekholm they were supposed to teach nor did (Sweden) or Margarita Navas Sánchez they have a background in teaching or (Spain) to Germany in order to gain in- even learning foreign languages. sights into international work done by Research in sign languages and especially sign language instructors. DGS had only just begun, the lexicon and Important input also came from the deaf grammar of DGS were only inadequately lecturers working at the “Zentrum für documented at the time. Deutsche Gebärdensprache” (Hamburg University), who reported about their experiences as university lecturers in work-

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shops and gave important advice for ucation and advanced training, and it en- teaching nonverbal communication and courages its members to acquire a quali- DGS. fying degree, as it is offered in the form Training of sign language teachers of a state examination by the Bavarian Institute for the Promotion of Communi- Today, sign language teaching is offered cation for People with Hearing Impair- in all major German cities. The number ment (http://www.giby.de) and by the of free-lance sign language teachers is Hessian Teachers' Academy (Hessische difficult to estimate, since only a small Lehrkräfteakademie). However, as yet, proportion of them is organized in BDG, there exists no basic professional training the professional association of the teach- for sign language teachers in Germany. ers for sign language (http://www.bdg- Sign language teachers seeking profes- gebaerdensprache.de). sional qualification depend on isolated The BDG sees itself as representing the further training measures or part-time interests of all full-time and free-lance courses, as they are currently offered at sign language teachers in Germany. At the University of Hamburg and by the Ba- the heart of the association’s work is the varian Institute. exchange of experiences in teaching sign Teaching concepts and materials language teaching, mainly offered to adult hearing L2 learners. The development towards a new breed of deaf sign language instructors who In recent years, however, DGS teaching confronted hearing learners proudly and methods have become increasingly im- confidently with their language and cul- portant as part of early childhood inter- ture essentially took place within a larger vention for hearing-impaired children movement that led to growing self- and in the context of establishing sign esteem and empowerment within the language as a subject in deaf schools. German Deaf community. In 2004, the BDG developed an occupa- Though in effect sign language classes be- tional profile, and in 2014 a special code came proper language learning experi- of practice was set up to ensure “the rep- ences, relationships with more conven- utation of the profession and safeguard tional foreign spoken language teaching the interests of the Deaf Community”. were explored only much later. Over the The code obligates the BDG’s members years, the following three teaching con- to participate regularly in continuing ed- 5.3 DE 58

cepts turned out to be of particular influ- "Grundkurs Deutsche Gebärdensprache", ence and relevance for deaf sign lan- which is now available in two volumes guage teachers looking for guidance and with extensive additional materials, is materials: the most successful and widely used DGS The "Hamburg" concept (Beecken teaching concept in Germany. et al. 1999) The "Frankfurt" concept (Happ When the first academic training for sign 2000) language interpreters started at the The teaching concept developed by the “Zentrum für Deutsche Gebärden- sign linguistics team of the University of sprache” in Hamburg in 1993/1994, lack Frankfurt is a good and useful addition to of a professional and application- the “Grundkurs Deutsche Gebärdenspra- oriented DGS teaching concept became che”. The Frankfurt concept was created evident. As a consequence, a project was in the year 2000. It consists of ten les- initiated which was to develop a DGS sons which are predominantly based on course based on the format and methods the grammar translation method, a syn- developed for the well-known ASL- thetic-deductive method of foreign lan- teaching programme “Signing natural- guage teaching which provides a syste- ly” (Smith et al. 1988). “Signing Natural- matic and rule-orientated approach to ly” was adapted in form and content to language learning. DGS is taught as a for- the cultural and linguistic characteristics eign language, introducing the units and of DGS and the German Deaf community. rules of the language step by step in a As the American model, its German ver- grammatical order. The acquisition of sion emphasizes direct and lively com- communicative competences, on the munication methods. Since the course other hand, is backgrounded in this ap- focuses on language functions and com- proach. munication and is not primarily based on The "Aachen" concept (Deaf and a systematic exposition of linguistic struc- Sign Language Research Team tures, many sign language lecturers have 2002) criticised the lack of a -well founded The third teaching concept which has en- grammar which would allow for didacti- joyed widespread use among Deaf sign cally oriented, structured grammar les- language teachers was published by the sons. Notwithstanding this criticism, the DESIRE-Team (Deaf and Sign Language 5.3 DE 59

Research) of the RWTH Aachen Universi- Applied Sciences (1997), the University ty. It offers many grammar-oriented les- of Applied Sciences Zwickau (2001) and sons but, differently from the Frankfurt the Humboldt University of Berlin (2003). concept, it is not a traditional grammati- Due to the high demand for sign lan- cal approach. In four volumes, the Aa- guage interpreters in Germany, two more chen concept offers a comprehensive training programmes have recently training course for DGS, characterised by opened up at the University of Applied highly detailed course planning of indi- Sciences Landshut (2015) and at the Uni- vidual teaching hours. It offers sugges- versity of Cologne (2017). Significant aca- tions for teaching methods, didactic in- demic research on sign language has also structions and theoretical background been carried out at the Goethe Universi- information concerning linguistic issues. ty Frankfurt and, more recently, at the There are also ready-to-use slides and Georg-August University Göttingen. suggestions for texts and drawings to be Sign language legislation used on blackboards. The concept serves both teachers and learners and is appre- Over the last 30 years, confidence and ciated for its practical orientation and self-awareness of the German Deaf com- usefulness. munity have grown significantly and deaf Sign language research people clearly recognize the central role that sign language plays in their lives. Research activities that focused on sign However, public use of German Sign Lan- language began in the 1980s (see guage (Deutsche Gebärdensprache, DGS) Prillwitz 1982, Ebbinghaus & Hessmann is still limited and the language is not ap- 1989). In 1987, the “Center for German plied with any consistency in schools, vo- Sign Language”, today’s Institute of Ger- cational training and employment. man Sign Language and Communication The 2002 Act on the Equality of Persons of the Deaf, was founded at the Universi- with Disabilities (Bundesgleichstellungs- ty of Hamburg (https://www.idgs.uni- gesetz) is generally regarded as a break- hamburg.de/en.html). through for the official recognition of Since the 1990s, academic training for DGS, but it is limited in application and it sign language interpreting was estab- is couched in terms of traditional disabil- lished at the University of Hamburg ity legislation. (1994), Magdeburg-Stendal University of While DGS is expressly recognized as an 5.3 DE 60

independent language, it is seen as just ses. This demand can be expected to one of a number of communication tools continue to rise in the context of a socie- to be applied in the rehabilitation of disa- ty that is inclusive and open to other lan- bled people, not as the language of a bi- guages and cultures. lingual and bicultural community. • The demand for well-trained and compe- Still, on the basis of legislation of this tent sign language teachers is unabated. kind, the provision of sign language inter- • Significantly more job-qualifying training preters has improved and Deaf people and further education offers must be de- have increasingly been enabled to exer- veloped that enable prospective sign lan- cise their rights and gain access to ad- guage teachers to prepare for the state ministrative proceedings and other social examinations currently offered. processes, though regulations remain • In addition to the classical target groups ambiguous and inconsistent. To give just of sign language teaching (sign language one example: A deaf woman who experi- interpreters, communication assistants ences domestic violence and seeks coun- and hearing L2 learners without specific selling will have a hard time in trying to professional interests), specialized teach- claim financial support to provide for ing offers need to be developed and es- sign language interpreting services. The tablished. The lack of qualified sign lan- 2017 Federal Participation Act (Bundes- guage teachers is particularly acute in teilhabegesetz), Germany’s attempt at the area of L1 teaching for hearing- implementing the regulations of the UN impaired children, the teaching of deaf Convention on the Rights of Persons with people with multiple disabilities and Disabilities, provides no general solution teaching offered to deaf immigrants. to this problem. • Finally, professionalization of sign lan- Conclusion guage teachers will depend on the estab- For the German situation, the following lishment of basic qualifying training pro- tendencies with regard to the teaching of grammes. The idea of a BA programme in sign language are characteristic: sign language teaching has been around • There is significant interest and demand for some time. It is high time to turn this for a solid offer of sign language courses idea into reality. for hearing L2 learners, for instance, in References: https://www.signteach.eu/ adult education centres and evening clas- index.php/book/references 5.3 DE 61 62

Interview with Andreas Costrau Director of gebaerdenservice.de and one of the first fully state-certified DGS instructors.

What are the course books don’t implement the Deaf strengths/ culture more. Right now, there are two weaknesses different level of professional trainings. within the situation/vocation of DGS instruc- I’d love to see more of the everyday DGS tors in Germany? Wat kind of professional sign language (BIO-DGS) and less aca- training have you done? demic DGS sign language (UNI-DGS) Well, to answer your question about my used. BIO-DGS uses less mouthing and vocation. I did the professional training more mouth gestures. And since you and what I have learned was good and know me, I pay attention to hand forms. informative, but it doesn’t represent the In our culture, using those ABC hand “language of the people” (everyday DGS forms is not common (like in TEAM, user). Us instructors oftentimes teach WORKSHOP, IDEA, etc.) It would be nice something different, not the “language if the instructors would dive more into of the people”. And that’s a shame. I the Deaf World. I know it’s not easy to would prefer us implementing this get a good professional training. “language of the people” into the curric- I’d like to see a new task group being ulum. For example: it is said that Deaf founded to deal with this subject. It’s a people are very blunt, but that’s not true shame that the Association has different – they are visual people. Only hearing priorities. We should keep the 3D in the people say that. language and not change it to 2D. Mean- Deaf people are more open and direct ing we should be using prepositions ma- without the stigmata of sexism (the nipulations and substrates. I want to meaning is apparent in the facial expres- work with people who have grasped sion, not the sign alone). Also, you don’t that. introduce yourself at the beginning of a Sorry, I’ve been diverting. Okay, so my meeting with MY SIGN NAME WHAT – goal is to nurture and support our lan- Deaf people don’t use those kinds of sen- guage. I’d love to see the curriculum be- tences. I think it’s a shame that DGS ing adapted to the new concept.

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Could you tell us about the development of That will be crucial for the professionali- curriculums of DGS classes in Germany? Do sation. they follow the GERS guidelines? What is What standing do DGS instructors have in done for it? Do you use it in your classes? Germany? Are there differences between I love GERS (CEFR). I have understood standings/vocational trainings/recognition? what it is about. It’ll help to evaluate lan- The interest in sign language grows. I guage levels on a common standard. But, think the level of popularity is on the I need intensive training for GERS. I’ve same level as Spanish. It would be great been waiting for an offer on it for 2 years. if we could leave Spanish behind us and It’s important for my course concept. I catch up with English. It’s got to do with am prepared for it and want to know the inclusion. But inclusion is for the disa- standards so I can implement it better. I bled. Sign language is not disabled. Many am really looking forward to that. of those taking the course tell us they This is a very good opportunity for all learn so much more than just language – in-structors. Some sign language they widen their horizons and get a taste schools have courses with GERS level. of communication. It’s not just about Now I want to know on what grounds learning the language and the culture, they use it. I don’t like this. I would they say that they gain a lot more in their prefer if all of us instructors would own lives by it. I think that is a positive use the same level/understanding thing. It’s a shame that many instructors with it. I think GERS has been specified don’t use sign language to build bridges. to level A2. I’m waiting for level B1/B2, It should be more 3D. There are so little so that I can implement it. That’s why I Deaf instructors dealing with this subject. need a training. Or the insti-tute visits It should be included in the professional the sign language school and evaluates training. their eligibility. That would be great. I What should be done in the future to im- am happy to pay for such an eval-uation prove the situation of DGS classes in Germa- of eligibility. I don’t know how it can ny? be done, if it can be done like for spoken languages, maybe by universities Of course, instructors need qualification. or the Institute. But they should But, we need to look at the system they work with us and include is in the are using. When they use the 2D scheme process. I think we should meet and and ABC hand forms, then a qualifica- talk about it. tion/certification is useless. They need to

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implement BIO-DGS into their curriculums. They need to re-evaluate what it is they want to teach. I have a qualification (comment: he’s one of the first fully state -certified DGS instructors in Germany). It won’t help to have the same qualification as someone teaching 2D style, it’s not the same value. I think it’s a shame that this might happen, but nevertheless, qualification is important. The instructors themselves need to re-evaluate their way of teaching. I am not happy with their methods. It requires a lot of time and experience to be a good instructor. When you are motivated and willing to learn, you will become a good one. It would be great if the course books could get an overhaul. Be- cause an instructor in the beginning needs guidance to become able to develop an own curriculum for his course.

Date of the interview: July 2017

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Interview with Falko Neuhäusel

Sign Language teacher at Hochschule Magdeburg-Stendal; owner / director of Gebärdenmanufaktur.

What are the Now I’ll answer 1.1. I can’t really judge strengths/ that point, because I haven’t given it weaknesses within the situation/vocation of much thought. I just know that there are DGS instructors in Germany? What kind of no trainings for DGS coaches on universi- professional training have you done? ty level. I’d like to start with one. There are There are several vocational trainings at two questions and I want to start different institutes established. But no with the second part. Shortly after the university level. That’s why we Wall came down, maybe 1992 or 1993, (University of Magdeburg-Stendal) have the first vo-cational training courses difficulties finding qualified sign language for DGS coaches were offered at instructors. Especially in Saxony-Anhalt, the University of Ham-burg. Before there are almost no sign language coach- then, hearing people had taught es. Some are teaching at community col- sign language to other hearing lege (VHS) although they didn’t have any people. The course members were formal training. I don’t like that. They are inter-national, for example, Deaf not professionals. people from Spain, Portugal, Austria The state’s Deaf Associations offer semi- and so on. The teachers were nars for sign language instructors. Back employees from the Uni-versity (the then, the sensitivity about the quality of Institute). Thus, I’ve learned a lot of teachers wasn’t there (DGS grammar, new things. We received a certificate. methods, didactic, etc.). It has gotten The training took two years and better since then. We should support the were done in blocks, including the motivation for coaches and the pay exams. That was the first training in should improve. I don’t know if you can Germany. There, I didn’t just learn DGS make a career out of it. I like it that the grammar, but also how to develop GIB in Nuremberg offers formal training teaching materials, how to work with for sign language instructors and some technology, etc. We worked with the deaf people from Saxony-Anhalt have book VISTA. It was a great and joined that training. enlightening time for me. 5.3 DE 66

Since the recognition of sign language, But I can’t speak for all of Germany. the demand of hearing people to learn Could you tell us about the development of sign language has risen a lot, so we need curriculums of DGS classes in Germany? Do more deaf coaches. A lot of hearing peo- they follow the GERS (CEFR) guidelines? ple are interested in learning sign lan- What is done for it? Do you use it in your guage. I wish for more deaf people doing classes? the training and working with us. The teaching material has improved a lot. What standing do DGS instructors have in Back then there was practically nothing Germany? Are there differences between and everyone had to “invent” it for standings/vocational trainings/recognition? themselves. Today, there are DVDs, I’ve already signed about this; some books and course material. That way, you teach at community college and don’t can develop a concept for your course. have a higher standing. They teach fol- Nowadays you can take ideas or material lowing their “guts” but without didactic from the internet and implement them methods. But there are some coaches into your concept. That’s great. We need who have a higher standing because they to go further. It’s not perfect yet. Vocabu- work at a sign language school or univer- lary material is still missing. A DGS corpus sity. They receive positive feedback and is great so students can learn at home. respect from the pupils. It depends im- I take GERS as an orientation, but I’m not mensely on the teacher who have yet following it by the letter, since it’s still worked out the qualification. And the new for all of us. My concept is similar to worked-out materials for class as well as that which GERS is describing. Our goal is the competence of the teacher. That’s to implement GERS. It’s great, because why you receive respect. Even if you you can easily see which level of DGS one don’t have a degree from university. Sad- has. ly, most teachers are “underpaid”. It Also, I use more PowerPoint these days. would be great if we had a university de- My old transparencies are used less and gree. But I don’t have one, sadly. But the less. But I still use the blackboard. development in that area is getting better, there are more and more teach- What should be done in the future to im- ers with academic degrees and setting up prove the situation of DGS classes in Germa- their own businesses (sign language ny? schools). I like that. They have the natu- First of all, I like it that there is the train- ral language and can facilitate it better. ing for DGS teachers at the GIB Nurem- 5.3 DE 67

berg. I don’t recall their requirements ex- That would be a huge advantage. They actly. I wish that more deaf people could wouldn’t need to re-do their exams. And be working within the teaching field of that’s not only for Germany, but for Eu- DGS. They should be more courageous rope. It’s not about language, it’s about and self-conscious and found their own the level. company and lead it. This should be supported. Also, I think GERS should be pro- Date of the interview: July 2017 gressed further and more trainings for teachers should be offered. Many instructors don’t have a clue about GERS. In Germany, they should all have the same level/knowledge. Thus, those who want to join a sign language school, a community college or university could switch between those institutions without having to get certificates for proof.

5.3 DE 68 Results SignTeach Survey: Germany

Number of respondents Almost all respondents teach German 31 responses. Sign Language, most at an advanced level (e.g. teaching in training programmes for Hearing Status sign language interpreters). Very few respondents teach LBG, “Signed German”. Imagine: you can make 3 wishes for your work as a teacher. What do you wish for?

97% of the German respondents (grey) are deaf, 3 % are hard of hearing. Native signers? Almost 80% of the German respondents

Most German respondents wish for more contacts with other sign language teachers. Open question: Good examples, advice? “To work with sign language teachers in a group because we can develop materials together.” (grey) learned to sign before age 11. Open question: Barriers? Do you teach the national sign language, or “There is a lack of interest from younger sign supported speech? deaf people in our region to become sign language teachers. The preparation class for the state certification exam is expensive and has to be paid for privately.” “Government.” More results can be found on the Sign- Teach website.

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Country Report 5.4 Iceland 70

5.4 Iceland Valgerður Stefánsdóttir, Samskiptamiðstöð heyrnarlausra og heyrnarskertra, Reykjavik (IS)

History teachers at the Deaf School. They made The first school for the deaf was founded the teaching material themselves but it on September 4th 1867 when Rev. Páll was based on the Danish book Pálsson was appointed the teacher of the „Undervisningsblade i Tegnsprog“. deaf. He took „mute“ In the eighties the Deaf School contained students into his a preschool where parents of deaf home and taught children received counselling and courses them using finger- in signed Icelandic. The teachers at these spelling and ges- courses were a few deaf students born in tures. Páll used the 1964 or earlier, all volunteers. At this Danish manual alpha time the sign Language users were not -bet because he had aware of their language, neither its been educated in structure nor grammar and the teaching Denmark himself. was therefore based on lists of words in It can be assumed Icelandic and a sign given for each word. that at this time Icelandic Sign language The students continued to hold courses, started to develop amongst the students. but because of lack of research, many 1974 questions concerning the grammar were At the beginning of June 1974 the Nordic unanswerable and therefore they felt Council of the Deaf (Døves Nordiske Råd) unsure about their teaching. held a congress in Iceland. After the 1978 congress, funding was started so that In 1978 The Icelandic Association of the communication with the other Nordic or Deaf published the first Sign Language in fact any other countries, could be Dictionary. It contained about 700 increased. It was also decided to hold Icelandic signs but also about 6-700 signs courses in Sign Language and publish a that had been borrowed from other Sign Language Dictionary. Nordic sign languages. A reviewed 1976 edition was published in 1987 containing In 1976 two deaf ladies, Hervör 1800 signs, of which many were Guðjónsdóttir and Sigurborg Skjaldberg, borrowed from The Danish Sign held a course in sign language for the 5.4 IS 71

Language Dictionary, Dansk Tegn Ordbog. where two deaf instructors and two new It also contained signs that the Nordic “interpreters“ worked together on Council had chosen as the common teaching Icelandic Sign Language and Nordic signs. At this time no research on interpreting. sign languages was available. Later it 1990—now came to light that it is not natural to The Communication Center for the Deaf coordinate usage of signs between and Hard of hearing (SHH) was founded countries, because sign languages have in 1990. Its function is to research and developed independently in each of the teach Icelandic Sign Language, to provide Nordic countries. interpreting and other services. Today 1986 the Sign Language teachers at SHH all In 1986 a Nordic Cultural Festival of the hold a teachers diploma (B.Ed). Deaf was held in Iceland and the Deaf In 1994, an academic program in Sign Association had to provide Icelandic sign Language Linguistics and Interpreting language interpreters at the festival. was started at the University of Iceland, Therefore, during the winter of 1985-86, in cooperation with SHH. Since that time, at the deaf club, these new teachers the teachers at SHH are required to take taught Icelandic Sign Language to a additional courses on sign language group of ten people with the aim that linguistics and deaf culture at the seven of them would be ready to University of Iceland. At SHH they receive interpret at the festival. Four interpreters training concerning teaching Icelandic „graduated“ and interpreted at the Sign Language. festival. Curricula, learning materials, CEFR Training of Sign language teachers In the beginning, the sign language During the winter of 1986-87 a course for teachers at SHH mainly used Signing instructors in sign language was held by Naturally: Student Videotext and the Deaf School in cooperation with The Workbook as a textbook, translated and Icelandic Association of the Deaf. The adapted, but slowly the Icelandic course covered 86 hours and all the material used today started to develop. participants were deaf or hard of This material is now under revision and hearing. The same winter the Deaf at the same time being adapted to the school offered some of their teachers CEFR. „interpreter training“ covering 100 hours

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Number of SL teachers written, about 10.000 signs can be found At SHH there are now three sign on SignWiki, the list is always growing. language teachers. They teach at the Sign language legislation Center, in high schools, elementary On June 7th 2011 legislation was passed schools and at the Sign Language by the Icelandic Parliament confirming Linguistics and Interpreting Programme the Icelandic Sign Language as the first at the University of Iceland. language of those who rely on it in Sign language research expression and communication, and of SHH and The Instute of Linguistics at the their children. The legislation also states University of Iceland together form a that Icelandic Sign Language and Centre for Sign Language Research. The Icelandic are equal as means of aim of the Centre is to encourage and expression in communication between support further researches in sign people and that it is prohibited to language, communication in sign discriminate people because of which of language, interpreting, language the languages they use. The legislation development of sign Language speaking also proclaimed the founding of a children and the teaching of sign Language Committee on Icelandic Sign language and interpreting. It also aims at Language. encouraging and supporting cooperation between those that undertake these researches to try to ensure the best usage of knowledge and funding. In recent years SignWiki, a web and mobile platform for Sign Languages and Deaf Education, was developed at SHH and launched in January 2012. Here you can find an Icelandic Sign Language Alþingi (parliament). Deaf people were in Dictionary, teaching and educational the parliament house when ITM was rec- material, scholarly articles, articles and ognized. Their t-shirts say I love sign lan- short courses in sign language. The users guage. of this website can contribute material and signs and change and improve what is already there. When these words are

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Interview with Valgerður Stefánsdóttir Director of the Communication Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in Iceland

What, in your attitudes towards the language and the opinion, are the people who speak it, which do not strengths or comply with the text of the Act. weaknesses of The right of people to learn ITM the current system in Iceland? according to the law is not respected in The legal environment for Icelandic sign so far as the learning of the language is language is strong in Iceland. On June 7, not easy due to, for example, availability. 2011, the Icelandic Parliament passed a The professional settings for sign Law on the Status of Icelandic and language teachers are insecure, wages Icelandic Sign Language. Articles 3, 5, 7, are low and teaching opportunities in and 13 of the Language Act contain some society are lacking. Teachers complain detailed provisions in support of the that they are not able to increase their users of Icelandic Sign Language (ITM). skills in a special field and they need to ITM is declared the “first language” of undertake a variety of tasks such as persons with hearing impairment, and it counseling, family-courses, children´s is a responsibility of the government and courses, material production, college and of municipalities to preserve it, university teaching etc. strengthen it and to support its use. In Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ accordance with Article 3, all persons in your country? who have a need for sign language must Excellent co-operation between the be given the opportunity to learn Ice- University of Iceland and the landic sign language and to use it from Communication Centre. the beginning of their language acquisi- The Communication Centre and the tion, or as soon as deafness, hearing im- University of Iceland´s Institute pairment or deaf-blindness has been di- of Linguistics have a formal co-operation agnosed. Their immediate family mem- on research in ITM and all the sign bers shall have the same right. language teachers who teach at the The weaknesses, on the other hand, university come from the appear in the language ideologies, the Communication Centre. 5.4 IS 75

An undergraduate programme in Sign Can you tell us about the accreditation of Language Linguistics and Interpreting is sign language teachers in your county? offered at the University of Iceland (UI). The study at the university meets all the Teacher training programme at the requirements of a regular B.Ed. / BA University is flexible regarding the programme. Deaf teachers with a B. Ed composition of studies and allows ITM to degree and no education in ITM can be one of the elective subjects to specialise in ITM by taking additional specialize in for teaching. courses in ITM grammar, the status of The development of all learning ITM and history and culture of the ITM materials for ITM teaching is centralized community, at the UI. in the Communication Centre, funded by The Icelandic Communication Centre the government, and produced in co- provides those sign language teachers operation by a group of deaf and who teach at the Centre or at the hearing professionals. All our materials University, with additional training. use a growing database of signs in Teachers are required to have a BA or Signwiki.com that everyone can access B.Ed degree, a specialisation in ITM online. grammar and history and culture of the

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ITM community, for appointment as a We would like to have close cooperation teacher. with European sign language teachers, if There is no central registration system of possible to make a European study qualified ITM teachers and no quality program and have national or European control of sign language teaching except standards for sign language teachers. at the Centre. The school system does not offer ITM Date of the Interview: April 2017 teaching as L1 or sets any special requirements for teaching deaf or hard- of-hearing children ITM as L1. There are no requirements in the public school other than general teacher training. There is no special education for teachers who want to teach ITM as a first language or bilingual teaching (IS/ITM).

Can you tell us something about curriculum development in your country? Are curricula based on the CEFR? The curricula developed by our Centre for L2 are now being adapted to the CEFR. What, in your opinion, is the way forward for sign language teaching & the training of sign language teachers in your country, and/ or in Europe? We would like to set up a model for ITM teacher education at the University of Iceland. Tailor the studies from the courses offered by the University and add other courses, especially suited for ITM teachers like didactics of teaching in SL or teaching SL and bilingual teaching.

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Interview with Rannveig Sverrisdóttir

Assistant professor in Sign Language Linguistics and Interpretation, University of Iceland

between the University and the What, in your Communication Centre for the Deaf and opinion, are the Hard of Hearing within the fields of strengths/ weaknesses of the current system teaching and doing research. in your country? Also, having a language committee, as Having a law on Icelandic Sign Language the law assumes. as the first language of the Deaf in Can you tell us about the accreditation of Iceland, as well as that Icelandic Sign sign language teachers in your country? Is Language is being covered in the the system as accessible Deaf teachers, as curriculum for elementary schools for hearing teachers? in Iceland are definitely the strengths At the moment there is no formal of the system in Iceland. Also, having accreditation of sign language teachers in sign language and interpretation as a Iceland. Educated teachers for subject at a university level. elementary school (B.Ed.) could (before) The weaknesses of the system take sign language as a subject but that are negative attitudes. This can be seen has not been on the programme for both in lack of actions (despite the law) some years now. and in poor financial contributions to Can you tell us something about curriculum the field. Ignorance and myths of sign development in your country? Are curricula languages and deaf culture make the based on the CEFR? system weak as well. Iceland now has a representative of Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ Icelandic Sign Language working on in your country? adaptation of the CEFR for the language. The acknowledgement of sign language/ What, in your opinion, is the way forward sign language interpreting as a subject of for sign language teaching & the training of higher education at the University of sign language teachers in your country, and/ Iceland as well as the co-operation or in Europe?

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In my opinion, it is important to increase at the University of Iceland in co- the requirements for sign language operation with specialist working at the teachers and their training, both in Communication Centre and at the Sign Iceland and in Europe. Language Linguistics programme at the There should be a study program that has School of Humanities. sign language as a special subject so teachers can be trained in teaching sign Date of the Interview: June 2017 language as L1 and L2, and in teaching in (Icelandic) Sign Language. In Iceland, this can be done at the School of Education

5.4 IS 79 Results SignTeach Survey: Iceland

Number of respondents The teachers teach sign language, not 4 respondents from Iceland. At the time ’sign supported speech’. of the Survey, the total number of sign Do you work together with other sign lan- language teachers in Iceland was 4. guage teachers? Age groups All respondents says: yes. Three wishes for further training? The main wish of the sign language teachers in Iceland: further training in using the CEFR. Open question: Advice, good examples? “We must tell hearing people about the history and culture of the deaf. Because Relatively, the Icelandic sign language teach- most of them do not know about this. ers (brown) are older than their European Sign language teachers must always know colleagues. This is mostly an effect of the about history.” small number of teachers in Iceland; one Open question: Barriers? teachers has recently retired. “It is difficult to teach children who have Who do you teach, most of the time? a CI. They don't know anything about our sign language's grammar and culture. Be- cause they aren't integrated in the deaf community.” “For us, I think the most difficult thing is to teach children - because we don´t have any program for them. I use some book for teaching English and I adapt it for sign language.” Sign language teachers in Iceland teach more deaf people than their colleagues in Europe. Almost all of the deaf learners More results can be found on the Sign- are babies and young children (under 12). Teach website.

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Country Report 5.5 Italy 81

5.5 Italy Michele Castiglione ISLA, Siena (IT)

History Training of sign language teachers The first Italian research on LIS (Italian The last 39 years mark a watershed in the Sign Language) was started in the 1980's training of sign language teachers, with a at the Institute of Psychology in Rome before and an after in the training meth- (now the Institute of Cognitive Sciences ods that have much changed, especially and Technologies) of the National Re- because of the results of scientific research Council. These investigations research. sulted for the first time in a description Before this time, the teaching was based of the most general characteristics of the mainly on a "word-sign" lexical approach. structure of LIS, including its lexical, mor- The teachers did not possess or follow a phological and morphological-syntactic true methodology. In this sense, the structures. The research work, since its teaching work was limited to imparting inception, was conducted in close collab- some notions. oration between both hearing and deaf Once research on LIS had begun, people, each with different but comple- it brought a lot of attention to the mentary skills. teaching of it. At first, some seminars During this period, Virginia Volterra's and short intensive 2/3 day courses "pioneering" research on sign language were orga-nized, focusing on teaching intersected with the curiosity and inter- methodolo-gies, then eventually the first est of Serena Corazza, who then contin- courses en-tirely dedicated to ued to deepen her linguistic studies at teaching teachers were organized. Gallaudet University in Washington. The number of hours that theses For all, including researchers and those courses necessitated increased as we who already knew and used LIS, these see in today’s courses. Currently first research projects led to the aware- discussion forums are much used as a ness of LIS as a language in all respects. tool that encourages comparative In 1992 the first bilingual dictionary of LIS dialogue between LIS teachers. Curricula, learning materials, CEFR was published, edited by Elena Radutzky. Teaching programs vary depending on the type of activity, the needs of the tar- 5.5 IT 82

get group, and the objectives to be number of hours, always structured ac- achieved. There are several forms: from cording to the Metodo Vista, with the ex- awareness-raising courses that provide ception of on-line instruction (which still generic and basic information, to pro- requires a certain number of in person grams that consist of a short module fo- contact hours) structured according to cused on specific and sectoral language, the Metodo C'E', the teaching model for example for the police or for people most popular in Turin. who want to set up a service counter for There are very specific teaching situa- deaf individuals. tions, such as those taking place at Uni- The most popular model of LIS courses is versities where the duration and content one that is divided into three levels of of the lessons vary according to the pro- teaching, although recently a small Ro- grammes, from the courses for commu- man association, in line with the results nication assistants where lessons are of scientific research, has introduced a mainly focused on theory and useful fourth level of teaching. However, this is techniques in educational or school con- a unique approach which is not yet wide- texts, to programmes for interpreters in- spread at the national level. training, that focus on techniques of in- The textbook used by the teachers for terpretation and an in-depth study of lin- the three levels of instruction is that of guistics. the "Metodo Vista", which also has work- Number of sign language teachers books for students for all three levels. According to the national register, there Many courses consist of two lessons per are hardly more than 100 teachers of week, with the majority of hours devoted Italian Sign Language, but there are many to teaching sign language and a small other teachers who, although not includ- part focusing on the more theoretical ed in this list, carry out teaching activi- subjects of Deaf culture, history and lin- ties. The overall number of sign language guistics, gradually increasing with more teachers fluctuates between 150 and specific and detailed information as the 200. level of instruction goes up. For many of them, the teaching is not Another type of program is the one used their main paid job; this is often some- for intensive courses: in these cases thing totally different. there are daily lectures with a greater

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Sign language legislation to create and encourage scientific research and teaching. Italy is still awaiting a law on the recognition of the Italian Sign Language. It is Despite the legislative vacuum, in fact, therefore difficult to predict the conse- the teaching of LIS is already present in quences that a LIS recognition law would some Italian universities and several lin- have on LIS teaching because it will de- guistic research projects have been pend on the content of the legislative launched. text, whether or not it would be possible

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Interview with Michele Castiglione Sign language teacher, coordinator of sign language courses

tional use inspired by the bilingual story Michele Castig- 'Stella'. lione has been a What, in your opinion, are the strengths or sign language weaknesses of the current system in Italy? teacher since 1995. He has taught differ- Among the many points that represent ent levels and has long been a coordina- the Italian system, I’ve chosen to call tor of sign language courses. For two attention to several in particular. years he worked as a LIS teacher at the The first has to do with Italian associa- SSLMIT University and he also taught tions: the smallest, which for years now deaf secondary school students at the have devoted themselves to teaching, Magarotto Institute of Padova. He has have reached a good level in terms of been a member of the examining com- quality. This is due not so much to the mittee to certify LIS teachers and has giv- length of their experience as to their abil- en many presentations on the subjects of ity to connect the job of teaching with communication, linguistics, deaf culture, new discoveries arising over time thanks the role and job of a teachers' coordina- to scientific research. This relationship to tor. ongoing updates has allowed the small In 2011 he was one of the founders of associations to distinguish themselves the movement LIS SUBITO! and was po- from other organisations found in Italy litically very active in the efforts made to and to carry on successfully with their obtain legal recognition for Italian Sign work. Language. Currently he is involved in the The second pertains to the quality level training and professional development of of the teaching: it has improved greatly sign language interpreters and is a mem- and, by contrast to the situation forty ber of ENSLT (European Network Sign years ago when the grammar taught was Language Teachers) since 2015. He has strictly anchored to the structure of been collaborating with Mason Perkins Italian, teachers today carry over the Deafness Fund Onlus for different work- grammatical rules of sign language. shops and to create a platform for educa-

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It must be said, however, that the same for the three levels of teaching made up difficulties still persist in evaluation of one part dedicated to the teacher and during intermediate and final testing and the other to the student. With respect to in the content of material to be the parameters laid out by the CEFR, this presented. manual covers linguistic levels A1 and B1, The third point concerns the recent even though the contents only partially introduction of a fourth level of teaching reflect the communicative goals referred sign language, a model still not very to in the Common European Framework widespread throughout Italy yet adopted of Reference. The fact of having ready- in a virtuous manner by several small made material on hand means that many associations that have clearly established teachers faithfully follow the contents length in terms of hours. In other cases, offered by the manual. the number of hours varies in relation to Can you give us example of 'best practice' the specific requirements of the project. in your country? If the creation of a fourth level of Italian teachers have begun to look upon teaching stands as a positive innovation, European events and teacher-training the down side is that an inadequate level opportunities with ever greater interest. of skills persists among teachers, Among these, for example, there’s the considering the fact that in order to symposium organized last autumn by the access the fourth level of teaching, it’s ENSLT (European Network of Sign important to have first gained substantial Language Teachers, November 2016) in experience in the three earlier levels. order to explore teaching techniques A similar situation occurs when, during a appropriate to the parameters found course, it proves necessary to entrust the within level B1 of the CEFR (Common teaching of the more theoretical and European Framework of Reference for linguistical aspects to a different expert Languages). On that occasion there was teacher if the practicum teacher is not an appreciable response on the part of equipped with these specific skills. This Italian teachers who took part in the is a possible weak point. European comparison, proving the fact that teaching in Italy upholds and The final point has to do with materials. continues to improve its level of quality. In Italy, sign language teachers have for many years now made use of a manual Tools for teaching are also growing

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thanks to increasingly advanced Can you tell us something about curriculum technologies that allow teachers to development in your country? Are curricula access materials with much more ease based on the CEFR? compared to the past, such as the Small associations, which for many years projection of video material instead of now have devoted themselves to teach- paper print-ups, or still images from ing and have taken part in scientific re- transparencies shown through an search on sign language, setting them- overhead projector. These technological selves apart from other associations, advances create the chance to gather have already committed to adapting their and select signed video material to be work to the parameters laid out by the found on many online channels, and to CEFR: in this case, the efforts to adapt make use of an ever-richer supply of may be attentively verified step by step materials. during work experience. Can you tell us about the accreditation of What in your opinion is the way forward for sign language teachers in your country? sign language teaching and training of sign Currently the total number of sign language teachers in your country and/or language teachers in Italy has not yet Europe? received official accreditation from the I believe that the situation of sign lan- MIUR (Ministry of Instruction, guage teachers can improve only on two Universities, and Research). This is also conditions: the creation of an association due to the fact that Italy has no law dedicated exclusively to sign language recognizing and regulating Italian Sign teachers, and the obligatory requirement Language. that all teachers hold a university degree Nevertheless, several Italian universities as well as teacher certification, as is re- avail themselves of the collaboration of quired of hearing teachers who teach Italian Sign Language teachers, who are spoken languages. This would create true chosen following an interview and the equality between hearing and deaf evaluation of their CV, or also because teachers. they hold a university degree pertinent to a specific area of teaching. Date of the Interview: April 2017

5.5 IT 88 Results SignTeach Survey: Italy

Number of respondents 25 respondents. Hearing Status

yes (blue, on the right), 33% say ‘no’ (orange, on the left).

60% of the Italian respondents (yellow) is Open question: good examples, advice? deaf, 4% hard of hearing, 36% hearing. “I am convinced that teachers of sign lan- Native signers? guage must graduate in Linguistics and they must have specific training in the teaching of sign language. Many teachers of sign language here in Italy do not have a good educational training.” “To be bilingual of course, to know the linguistics and grammar of the two languages L1 and L2, let's stop allowing people to teach sign language just because 72% of the Italian respondents (yellow) they are deaf. For teaching a language learned to sign before the fourth birth- you need to study for years the L1 and day. The hearing sign language teachers L2.” probably learned to sign at home, from Open question: Barriers? deaf parents and can still be considered “In Italy, sign language is not recognised ‘native signers’. as a language yet.“ Have you had any special training for teach- “LIS is not recognised by the state. Some ing sign language? ? organisations have sign language teach- Compared to their European colleagues, ers, who have had no training at all.” fewer sign language teachers have had More results can be found on the Sign- special training for teaching sign lan- Teach website. guage. 67% of the Italian respondents say 5.5 IT 89

Country Report 5.6 the Netherlands 90

5.6 the Netherlands Liesbeth Pyfers, Pragma, Hoensbroek (NL)

In some respects, the situation of sign people. Later, Wim Emmerik became an language teachers and sign language internationally known sign language teaching in the Netherlands is different poet. from most other countries. Yet the begin- Other deaf sign language users followed nings were the same. Wim’s example and began to teach the History Sign Language of the Netherlands. At The Sign Language of the Netherlands first, they taught hearing professionals: (SLN or in Dutch: NGT) has been used for parent counsellors, teachers, social work- centuries, but wasn’t researched and re- ers. These professionals would then cognised as a language until the 1950’s. teach the signs, usually as ‘Signed Dutch’, The first sign language dictionary was not to parents of young deaf children. Signed published until 1988. Until that time, sign Dutch uses signs to ‘support’ or language teachers were deaf people who ‘visualize’ spoken words. It is not sign had had no training in teaching a sign language, the speaker uses voice and the language and who developed their own word order of the spoken language. materials. One of the first teachers of In the beginning, there were many dis- sign language in the Netherlands was cussions about the question whether Wim Emmerik. When he started in 1977 deaf people could be allowed to teach he insisted that he taught pantomime, sign language to hearing parents of not sign language. In those days, sign lan- young deaf children—who usually had guage was used within the Deaf Commu- had no previous contacts with deaf peo- nity, but it was not taught to hearing ple, or sign language. How would they communicate? Things changed fast. Deaf people became more aware of the importance of their own language and began their continuing struggle for equal rights and recognition of their language and culture. More and more research showed

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that sign language did not harm deaf taught as a second language with the children, but was, in fact, crucial for their main focus on reading and writing. language, cognitive and last but not As a result of these developments, the least: social emotional development. demand for sign language courses for

By 1995 all schools for the Deaf in the parents, teachers, and then sign lan- Netherlands were officially ‘bilingual’. guage interpreters grew rapidly. Teachers used the Sign Language of the Sign language interpreters Netherlands as the language of commu- In 1988, deaf people in the Netherlands nication and instruction in the class- obtained the right to a sign language in- rooms. Deaf teaching assistants and deaf terpreter—for a limited number of hours teachers made their entrance and be- per year. This eventually led to the estab- came role models, both for the children lishment in 1998 of a four-year interpret- and the hearing teachers. Dutch was 5.6 NL 92

er training programme—and more de- meet the entry requirements, and/or can mand yet for sign language teachers, sign afford the costs of the 4-year training language curricula, sign language diction- progamme. As a result, most of the stu- aries and learning materials. dents are hearing and not native sign lan- Training of sign language teachers guage users. Many start the training with limited or even no sign language skills In 1992 the national Dutch Sign Centre and little or no knowledge of, or experi- was established with government fund- ence with the Deaf community. ing. The Centre develops curricula for There is no registration of teachers who sign language teaching, teaches sign lan- graduate. In the Netherlands, anyone can guage teachers, produces materials and call him-/herself a sign language teacher. sign language dictionaries, and does re- When people look for a sign language search. The training of teachers is infor- course, they often don’t know if the mal, there is no registration or certifica- teacher will be deaf or hearing, or what tion of teachers who complete the train- training he or she has had. ing. Over the years, the training of sign language teachers by the Dutch Sign Cen- Curricula, learning materials, CEFR tre has changed to take into account The Dutch Sign Centre has developed changing insights and changes in target curricula, learning materials and an e- groups. learning environment for sign language In 1998 the Institute for Sign Language courses for different target groups and Deaf Studies of the Hogeschool (parents, teachers, general public) and Utrecht started the only 4-year training different levels. The curricula have re- programme for sign language teachers cently been updated to take into account and interpreters in the Netherlands. It is CEFR developments. a formal Bachelor training programme Schools for the Deaf use a special curricu- (B.Ed) with regular entry requirements. lum, developed to teach the Sign Lan- In 2004, a Master programme (M.Ed) was guage of the Netherlands to deaf chil- added. dren. On the positive side, students at the HU receive a solid training in sign language Several independent sign language teach- and sign language teaching. The down- ers have developed their own commer- side, few deaf sign language teachers cial curricula; some of these are for spe-

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cial target groups or based on a specific 1988, with its call on the Commission to methodology for spoken L2 teaching (e.g. make a proposal to the Council concern- TPRS by Gebarentaal voor Iedereen, in ing official recognition of the sign lan- English: Sign Language for All). guage used by deaf people in each Mem- Number of SL-teachers ber State; and its call on the Member States to abolish any remaining obstacles Because there is no registration of sign to the use of sign language and to support language teachers, we don’t know how pilot projects aimed at teaching sign lan- many sign language teachers there are in guage to hearing children and adults, us- the Netherlands. Many teachers are em- ing deaf people trained for the purpose ployed by the schools for the Deaf, some and to back research in this area. by universities, some by Deaf Centres Recognition of the Sign Language of the while others are self-employed. Netherlands however, has proved difficult, The National Organisation of Language as not even spoken Dutch is enshrined in Teachers has a section for teachers of federal legislation. Despite a lack of offi- sign language; however, the section only cial legal recognition as an independent has a limited number of members and language, sign language is mentioned in has not been very active in recent years. educational and care legislation. Sign language research Back to the beginning? Four Universities have a sign language re- Many things have changed, but in some search programme: Amsterdam, Nijme- respects it seems as if we’re back where gen, Leiden and Utrecht (for addresses we started, 40 years ago: and links, see the SignTeach website). • The Sign Language of the Nether- Sign language legislation lands: still no legal recognition. Since the beginning of the 1980s organisa- • Many sign language teachers in the tions for the Deaf in the Netherlands have Netherlands are hearing. According to fought for recognition of the Sign Lan- our Survey: 53%. This percentage is guage of the Netherlands (NGT) as the much higher than in any of the other official language of deaf people. European countries. A major incentive for this struggle was the • Many of the sign language teachers in resolution of the European Parliament in the Netherlands (also) teach Signed

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Dutch. At the beginners and interme- wishes for their work: more learning diate level: almost as often as they materials and more online learning teach NGT, the Sign Language of the materials. Netherlands. Again, these percent- What we don’t know: is this the way for- ages are higher than in any of the oth- ward (or backwards?) for all European er European countries. countries, or is the Netherlands an ex- • Few deaf children now learn the Sign ception? Language of the Netherlands as their What we do know is that all Dutch re- first language. In the Survey, the respondents, as well as the experts who we spondents report that they teach less interviewed, agree that more collabora- than 5% of their courses to deaf ba- tion is needed, both nationally and inter- bies or toddlers. The majority of the nationally. learners are hearing adults.

• On average, the deaf sign language teachers in the Netherlands have received less training than the hearing sign language teachers. Hearing sign language teachers on the other hand, again on average, have learned the Sign Language of the Netherlands as a second language in a school context, have fewer contacts with ’real’ sign language users, and are less involved in the Deaf community.

• Although we now have sign language dictionaries, both printed and online, high-quality learning materials, sign language apps and an e-learning platform for sign language teachers, 40-50% of the Dutch respondents of the Survey say that they develop their own learning materials. Their main

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Interview with Trude Schermer

Director of the Dutch Sign Centre, Amersfoort (NL)

Other activities: researching the grammar Can you tell us of NGT, workshops, providing information something about about NGT and advising on the use of the Dutch Sign signs in the communications with differ- Centre? ent target groups. The Dutch Sign Centre (www.gebaren- The Dutch Sign Centre employs a team of centrum.nl) was established in 1996 and 11 staff members. is the national independent centre of expertise for the Sign Language of the What, in your opinion, are the strengths or Netherlands (NGT) and for Signed Dutch weaknesses of the current system in the (NmG). As Lexicographic Institute for NGT Netherlands? the Dutch Sign Centre aims to collect One of the weaknesses of the Dutch sys- signs from deaf native signers in the tem is that almost all students who study Netherlands, to maintain and develop at the Hogeschool Utrecht to become a the lexicon of NGT further and to make sign language teacher are hearing and the lexicon available by means of an achieve B2 level of NGT at the most. online sign dictionary which contains Many start without any knowledge of both standard signs and regional vari- sign language or the Deaf Community. ants. The link between NGT teachers and its With our work we want to build a bridge native users is becoming less and less. between deaf NGT users, the Deaf com- Can you give us examples of ‘best practice' munity, and all people who use signs. We in your country? want to contribute to a greater visibility I can give you two examples. One: the de- of NGT as a language in the Netherlands velopment of almost all learning materi- and to strengthen the position of deaf als has been centralized in the nineties people who use NGT in the Dutch society. and it was a joint effort of the Dutch Deaf Community and Deaf Education Adminis- Another main activity is the development trators. It has been responsibility of the and production of teaching materials, Dutch Sign Centre: a group of deaf and (digital) dictionaries and educational ma- hearing professionals, working together. terials. 5.6 NL 97

Another best practice: the Dutch Sign on the CEFR. Curricula developed by Centre is also the national centre for NGT Kentalis (the national organisation of lexicography which is partly funded by schools for the deaf) are also based on the Dutch Government. All our materials CEFR. use a growing database of standard signs What, in your opinion, is the way forward and regional variants which is accessible for sign language teaching & the training of via an online dictionary. sign language teachers in your country, and/ Can you tell us about the accreditation of or in Europe? sign language teachers in your country? We must cooperate much more closely, The training programme of the Hoge- both nationally and internationally. Sign school Utrecht meets all the require- language teachers, especially those who ments of a regular BA or MA programme. work independently, often see each oth- The Dutch Sign Centre trains sign lan- er as competitors, fighting for the same students or jobs. guage teachers, and so do the schools for Legal recognition of the Sign Language of the deaf. Unfortunately, we do not have the Netherlands will help, as will national a central registration system of qualified or European standards for sign language teachers; there is no quality control of teachers. Another development that we independent sign language teachers. will have to deal with: most of the new Anyone who wants, can teach sign lan- materials that we now develop are for guage in the Netherlands. Signed Dutch, not for Dutch Sign Lan- Can you tell us something about curriculum guage, because this is what schools and development in your country? Are curricula parents of deaf children ask for. If we are based on the CEFR? not careful, soon only a handful of chil- The curricula developed by our Centre dren, deaf or hearing, will learn the Sign have been adapted and are now based Language of the Netherlands as a first language. Do you have any recommendations that you want to share with us? It is important to stimulate young deaf signers to inform parents of deaf children about their experiences in life and the advantages of a bilingual education.

The team of the Dutch Sign Centre, 2016 Date of the Interview: June 2017 5.6 NL 98

IGT&D

The questions were answered by a group of Profes sionals from IGT&D (Instituut voor Gebaren, Taal & Dovenstudies), Hogeschool Utrecht NL, University of Applied Sciences )

What, in your opinion, are the strengths or to offer a sign language program to pro- weaknesses of the current system in the fessionals who work in Health Care. All Netherlands? That is,: the current system of organisations recognise the CEFR as a teaching sign language and the training of tool to award sign language levels to sign sign language teachers? language learners. Strengths: in the Netherlands, we have a At Universities (e.g. Radboud University Bachelor Program Sign Language Teacher and Utrecht University of Applied Scienc- as well as a Master Program. es) there is research on sign language Weaknesses: Not all students have pedagogy. strong connections with the Deaf com- Can you tell us about the accreditation of munity sign language teachers in your country? Some schools for the deaf do not regard Is there a (formal, informal) system? How sign language as the first language choice does it work? Does it work well? Does it in- since the CI has been introduced. clude different qualifications for teachers of different target groups, e.g. teaching par- It is not possible (by law) to select stu- ents, teaching university students, etc.? Is dents who enrol in the Bachelor program the system as accessible for Deaf teachers as for Sign Language teachers and interpret- for hearing teachers? ers; the Netherlands has an open access registration system for all students. This There is a Bachelor as well as a Master sometimes leads to students with less program with an accredited degree (B.Ed ‘aptitude’ for signing or teaching to en- and M.Ed), but the title is not protected rol. and in fact, everyone can call himself a sign language teacher. In addition to the Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’, in your country? bachelor and master program, short NGT Some organisations (Kentalis, Auris, programs are offered a./o. by the Dutch Hogeschool Utrecht [Utrecht University Sign Centre. The latter serves the group of Applied Sciences, HU]) work together of sign language teachers who cannot, or

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do not want to, follow the bachelor prosign language teachers in your country, and/ gram. Teachers certified by one of these or in Europe? programs can teach all groups (e.g. par- Proper training and research into sign ents, university students, etc.), but some language pedagogy. Currently, there is an Institutes (for example HU, where stu- ECML project, PRO-Sign 2, which endeav- dents are taught on a tertiary level) de- ours to formulate competencies and mand a teacher to have a master degree standards for SL teachers, in order to im- (e.g. bachelor or master program) prove sign language teachings in the EU at all levels (i.e. diploma courses/ HU teaches deaf as well as hearing stu- university degrees). dents as NGT teachers. Hearing students must demonstrate a minimum of level B2 Do you have any recommendations that you to receive their diploma. The Dutch Sign want to share with us? At this point in time, it is of the utmost Centre only trains deaf teachers. importance to join hands in Europe to Can you tell us something about curriculum raise the standard of sign language development in your country? Are curricula teaching. Only through collaboration can based on the CEFR? we strive to educate excellent SL teach- Yes, all organisations (HU, Dutch Sign ers. These teachers, in turn, can play a Centre, Kentalis) work with the CEFR. decisive role in sign language teaching to There has been a collaboration between both children and adults. different organisations in a research group in 2010-2013. After that, the The Deaf communities in the EU should different organisations developed their be educated about their own language, own programs. and about their language rights. In general, HU teaches at all CEFR levels, Projects like SIGNTEACH and PRO-Sign other organisations at A1 and A2 levels play an important role in disseminating only. knowledge about the field of Deaf Stud- ies and SL pedagogy. Assessment of CEFR levels in learners can be done at HU, with an official adaptation of the ASLPI (granted by RIT, Roches- Date of the interview: 23 June 2017 ter USA) called NGT-FA (NFA for short). What, in your opinion, is the way forward for sign language teaching & the training of 5.6 NL 100 Results SignTeach Survey: NL

Number of respondents The respondents teach more hours per The Netherlands: 34. month than most of their colleagues in the EU. Hearing Status

53% of all Dutch respondents (orange) are hearing, versus only 15% of all Euro- What do you teach: the national sign lan- pean respondents (blue). guage, a foreign sign language, or ‘sign supported speech’? Native signers? Compared to their colleagues, sign language teachers in the Netherlands more frequently (also) teach Signed Dutch. At the beginners and intermediate level, they teach Signed Dutch almost as often as they teach the national sign language, NGT. Most of the sign language teachers in the Open question: Barriers? Netherlands learned NGT, the language “This is a very hard question to answer they teach, as adults as a second/foreign (so many things can be named here). I language. think there is a gap between how NGT is How many hours do you teach, per month? used by the deaf community and how we teach NGT at the university. This makes teaching of NGT hard. The lack of good teaching materials is also an issue for me.” More results can be found on the SignTeach website. 5.6 NL 101

Country Report 5.7 Norway 102

5.7 Norway Aud Karin Stangvik, Statped, Trondheim (NO)

History Universities established Sign Language Interpreting and Sign Language Studies, In Norway deaf children gained their right to sign there was a language education, and parents got the deaf person, opportunity to attend 40 weeks of sign Andreas Chris- language training with a new program tian Møller, called "See My Language". who established the first Dedicated curriculum school for the For elementary school and upper second- deaf back in ary school, deaf students could follow a 1825. At this dedicated curriculum in four subjects, in- school, sign language was the language cluding Norwegian sign language. of instruction. In addition, the University College of Sør- Eventually, several deaf schools were es- Trøndelag offered a study for deaf teach- tablished, and during the late 1800, the er students studying how to teach Nor- discussion came about what was the cor- wegian sign language and the other sub- rect language of instruction: sign lan- jects in a dedicated curriculum. Here, the guage or spoken language? students were especially qualified to For a long period, Norwegian sign lan- teach Norwegian sign language as a sub- guage was preferred, but eventually Nor- ject. wegian spoken language was introduced Ål Folk High School as the language of instruction. At the same time, Ål Folk High School and Golden age Course Center for the Deaf offered a one- In 1985, we had the first parliamentary year study program for sign language report that recognizes Norwegian sign teachers. language as a language, and the 90s be- With the development in the 1990s, it came a golden age for Norwegian sign was now possible to study and be quali- language and sign language teaching. fied to teach sign language to different

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target groups at different levels. Sign lan- Behind all the good intentions, a true guage teachers could study and discuss acknowledgement of sign language, and the pedagogic and didactic aspect of sign what it takes to teach a language, seems language teaching. to be missing. Today, we experience that Today sign language teachers teach at sign language interpreters, assistants and schools for deaf, in mainstream schools, teachers with low-level language skills in colleges and universities, at Signo, are set to teach students in sign lan- Statped, deaf associations and at Ål Folk guage. High School and Course Centre for the For years now, the university has tried to Deaf. establish studies that qualify students to teach sign language. Only in this way can Qualifications we ensure sign language education and However, qualification of sign language teaching based on a true acknowledge- teachers and teachers who teach the ment of sign language as a language. We subject Norwegian sign language has be- need qualified teachers to achieve the come a neglected area. political intentions. The study programmes for the deaf at Learning Resources University College of Sør-Trøndelag and Statped develops bilingual learning re- Ål Folk High School were closed down, sources for deaf and hard of hearing chil- and in the near future, we will lack quali- dren. They develop materials for kinder- fied sign language teachers. garten and learning resources for prima- There is still political will to offer sign lan- ry and secondary education and training. guage teaching for different target In addition, they develop learning re- groups. In the light of inclusion, sign lan- sources for sign language teaching. guage training is not only for deaf chil- Statped is also responsible for the devel- dren and their parents, but it is now also opment of the Norwegian sign language on the agenda for fellow students, sib- dictionary. The website www.erher.no lings and hearing children of deaf par- gives access to all the resources that ents. Statped has developed for the deaf and Paradox hard of hearing. The big paradox then is that we missed the focus on qualifying teachers who can realise the good intentions. 5.7 NO 104 105

Interview with Torill Ringsø

Assistant Professor, Division of Language and Communica- tion, Signed language and Interpreting, Department of Language and Literature, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim

sign language teachers, in your county? Is What, in your opin- there a (formal, informal) system? Is the ion, are the strengths / weaknesses of the system as accessible for deaf teachers as current system in your country? That is: the for hearing teachers? current system of teaching sign language This goes back to question number one. and the training of sign language teachers. To be hired as a teacher where most of The most important weakness is that the sign language training goes on, you there is no organised education/training have to have an MA, in some cases a BA. for sign language teachers in Norway. But again, we need better opportunities There are also very few deaf young peo- to train sign language teachers. Deaf stu- ple who choose to study teaching. Most dents may enter both teacher proof the sign language teaching happens in grammes and sign language interpreter university or university colleges and re- programmes, and hopefully we`ll have source centers, where there is a require- more deaf teachers with proper training ment to have a Masters degree in order in the years to come. to be hired. A strength is that the community is tight knit, so we all know each Can you tell us something about curriculum other and can pull our resources togeth- development in your country? Are curricula er when we need to. based on the CEFR? There are three ITPs (Interpreter Training Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ Programmes) in Norway, at university in your country? and university college level. They are co- When educational institutions work with operating on developing their curricula, the deaf community to give sign lan- but so far this is not based on the CEFR. guage learners access to deaf social are- However more of the staff are increas- nas, for example taking students to the ingly learning about the CEFR and it will deaf club. most likely affect future developments. Can you tell us about the accreditation of

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What, in your opinion, is the way forward, for sign language teaching & the training of sign language teachers in your country, and/ or in Europe? Provision of training for future teachers of signed language at BA and MA-level. We particularly need more deaf sign language teachers, and we must encourage them to enter this exciting field.

Date of the interview: May 2017

5.7 NO 107 Results SignTeach Survey: NO

Number of respondents Norway: 19. Age groups

Do you work together with other sign language teachers?

Compared to their European colleagues, the Norwegian respondents (olive) are somewhat older: almost 90% are over age 40. Native signers?

Over 90% of the Norwegians respondents work together with other sign language teachers. Open question: Good examples, advice? “Work with other sign language teachers Over 50% of the Norwegian respondents and have respect for each other's work.” (olive) learned to sign before age 5. Al- most no one learned to sign after age 20. More results can be found on the Sign- Who organized your training? Teach website. Over 80% of the Norwegian respondents have had training in teaching sign language. The training was most often organized by a national or regional Deaf Asso- ciation or a university. 5.7 NO 108

Country Report 5.8 United Kingdom 109

5.8 United Kingdom Lynne Barnes, University of Central Lancashire, Preston UK

History Association (BDA) in conjunction with the Department for Health and Social Securi- Since British Sign Language (BSL) is an un- ty initiated the first BSL Tutor Training written language, its early history is Agency (BSLTA) in the Deaf Studies Re- poorly understood. The very few written search Unit at the University of Durham. records about the use of sign language BSLTA then developed the hugely suc- by the deaf communities in Britain were cessful deaf-led BSL Tutor Training almost exclusively created by hearing Course (known as Durham University BSL people, but there is solid evidence that Teacher training Course [DUBSLTTC]). deaf people in Britain were signing as early as in the 16th century although This course was taught by deaf people most scholars believe that they were and delivered a practical BSL curriculum, signing much earlier. which was underpinned by sign linguistics, the principles of second language Thomas Braidwood’s ‘Braidwood’s Acad- learning and teaching practice. This was emy for Deaf and Dumb’ that opened in the first university-based course of its 1760 is considered to be the first school kind, which was soon followed by devel- in Britain to include sign language in edu- opments at the University of Bristol and cation. He introduced the so-called com- the City Lit (London). Unfortunately, the bined system, a form of sign language course at Durham closed in 1999 when that set the standards of BSL as we know the Deaf Studies Research Unit ceased to it today (Sign Community 2003). exist. Training of Sign Language Teachers There have been a few Specialist BSL Training courses for those wishing to Teacher Training Courses since the de- teach British Sign Language were only in- mise of DUBSLTA, but again these have troduced in the late 1970s and thus are a been relatively short-lived. Between comparatively recent innovation in the 2004-2005, the University of Bristol de- UK. On the whole, sign language teacher veloped a BSL teacher training course in training courses have been provided on a conjunction with the BDA and supported piecemeal basis. In 1984 the British Deaf by Department of Work and Pensions

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funding. This was an initiative to improve tion colleges (For example, Certificate in employment prospects for profoundly Teaching in the Lifelong Learning Sector deaf sign language users. Whilst a new (CTLLS) Diploma in Teaching in the Life- curriculum was developed, this course long Learning Sector (DTLLS) (see was not accredited, and therefore did www.ifl.ac.uk) and more latterly Level 4 not fit within the UK qualifications frame- Certificate in Education and Training and work. In 2005 Heriot-Watt University in Level 5 Diploma in Education and Train- Scotland developed the Graduate Diplo- ing. However– these are generic teaching ma in Teaching BSL Tutors (ToT). This qualifications, not specific to the teach- course was designed specifically for ing of BSL. teaching sign language tutors to become Curricula, Learning Materials, trainers of other tutors. This stopped CEFR running in 2011. There is no one official curriculum for the The University of Central Lancashire teaching of BSL. However, there are na- (UCLan) instigated a BSL Teacher Training tional awarding organisations that run Course (BSLTTC) in 2008. Initially funded training for BSL teachers to teach their by the I-Sign project the course was de- qualifications. These awarding organisa- livered in BSL by experienced BSL teacher tions have their own curricula, teaching -trainers and incorporated the CTLLS materials and resources. The first of qualification (below), together with a these awarding bodies is Signature CPD module in Applied Sign Linguistics. (formerly the Council for the Advance- By using the accredited teacher training ment of Communication with Deaf Peo- qualifications, BSL Teacher Training was ple or CACDP), whose work spans over put onto the national qualifications three and half decades. Over this time, framework. Unfortunately, this course they have expanded and developed into has not run since 2011. one of the leading national charities in For many potential BSL teachers, the be- the sector. Their qualifications can be spoke courses offered at these universi- found at http://www.signature.org.uk/ ties were short-lived, not accessible or qualification-specifications.php. feasible. The main path to becoming a The Institute of British Sign Language sign language teacher was, and still re- (IBSL) is a leading UK awarding organisa- mains, attending mainstream teacher tion providing British Sign Language (BSL) training courses in local Further Educa- 5.8 UK 111

and other qualifications linked to Deaf recorded. Studies. They develop qualifications ac- Research credited by Ofqual and can be found at In the UK in 2010 a research project was http://ibsl.org.uk/. commissioned to investigate the situa- Whilst these awarding bodies offer BSL- tion regarding sign language teaching. related courses and Ofqual-accredited The project had three main objectives. BSL qualifications, they do not currently The first was to gain grass-roots insight include BSL teacher training with formal into the profession of BSL teaching on a government Ofqual-accredited qualifica- very practical level. The second was to tions that are nationally recognised by ascertain key barriers to BSL teaching as Higher Education and Further Education perceived by practitioners who are ac- institutions as pre-requisites for teach- tively involved in sign language teaching. ing. The third was to explore sign language There are numerous internet resources teachers’ ambitions in terms of their pro- which support the teaching of BSL. One fessional development. of the most successful is BSL:QED (http:// The findings of this research were dis- bslqed.com/) which provides a curricu- seminated in a report entitled: No time? lum guide and resources for the study of No support? No idea? (Eichmann & BSL at Higher Education level. It was the Barnes, 2010). The key findings are sum- first curriculum for the teaching of BSL at marised below: this level and was guided by the CEFR. • BSL teaching often takes place at incon- Number of sign language teachers venient times and, what is more, for It is not possible to report the precise many teachers represents one source of number of British Sign Language teachers income that needs to be balanced in the UK. British Sign Language teachers against other jobs held by the individual. are not regulated and do not have to be • For the BSL teaching profession to pre- registered as a sign language teacher. sent a genuine career option for deaf Training centres and providers have to be sign language using individuals, it needs registered with the awarding bodies in to be systemically regulated by and sup- order to teach the accredited qualifica- ported from within the wider education tions, but individual teachers are not sector. identified, nor their hearing/deaf status

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The data generated in this research show tember and is the first of its kind in the that clear information regarding career United Kingdom. progression pathways (including required The legislation aims to raise awareness of information) are not only needed but British Sign Language (BSL) and improve that these needed to be made available access to services for those using the lan- and accessible to (potential) sign language by requiring the Scottish Govern- guage teachers. ment and listed local bodies to publish Sign Language Legislation and implement their own plans for how they will promote the use of the lan- On 18 March, 2003, the Government guage. This is landmark legislation and made a formal statement that it recog- could act as a critical step in strengthen- nised that BSL is a language in its own ing the position of the British Sign Lan- right (quoting an estimated 70,000 peo- guage in Scotland. The legislation has the ple whose preferred language it is), and potential to improve and elevate sign promising to invest £1 million in a pro- language teaching, sign language teacher gramme of initiatives to support this training, education for deaf children and statement. This followed 4 years of cam- services for deaf people. paigning and BSL marches through the streets, road blockades and political activity, which brought mainstream media coverage and culminated in 10,000 people marching to Trafalgar Square. Howev- er, this was not legislation, only recognition. Campaigners who had hoped this recognition would lead to real change later became disillusioned at its lack of teeth and are now pressing for legal recognition. Scotland Introduced by Mark Griffin (MSP) to the Scottish Parliament on 30 October 2014,the British Sign Language (Scotland) Act 2015 was passed into law on 17 Sep- 5.8 UK 113

Clark Denmark remembers: Sign Language Teaching in the UK. Interview by Luigi Lerose

When did the thinking change and Deaf people start teaching sign language? Well around the time British Sign Lan- guage research became very popular about 1978/9. In America research was happening much earlier but in the UK around that time, deaf people really had an awakening. They realised that what Interview (Int. Sign): https://youtu.be/LRtk97iYNBA they were using was a real language, their language; it was BSL. When did Deaf people begin to teach BSL in When this change occurred where did you the UK? find the deaf people to do the work? Before answering when deaf people There was a very small pool of deaf peo- started teaching BSL in the UK let me ple that they could choose from. give a historical context going further The research to that point had mainly back. There had been teaching of BSL but been conducted by hearing people. it had not been by deaf people but rather There was one Deaf person who been by hearing people. born and raised in the UK but had moved Almost always the teacher was someone to the United States to study at Gallaudet who worked for the church. Historically University. She knew about sign language Deaf clubs in the UK have been run by research and sign linguistics. After she hearing members of the clergy. That said graduated she stayed in the US working. they were very proficient sign language After some time she decided to return to users. They were so proficient users of the UK. The name of that person was Dot the language that if you didn’t know Miles. She began sign language teaching already it would be very difficult to in the UK. identify whether they were hearing or What happened next? Did Dot encourage Deaf based on their use of the language. other people to become teachers too? But deaf people were stopped from Oh yes. Dot was unprecedented within running their own Deaf clubs by them.

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the Deaf community up to that point. We had only had hearing people talk to us about this subject in the past, but now we had a deaf person and she was truly inspirational. The British Deaf Association (BDA) then commissioned Dot to work on assembling a book of photographs of British Sign Language. But this was not just a dictionary of signs but guidelines on how to teach sign language practically Dorothy Miles, https://youtu.be/ to other people. That was the first book of its kind in the UK. That book was cre- people who then bombarded the BBC ated around 1979. with requests to learn sign language. The When deaf people came together to be BBC asked the British Deaf Association taught how to become teachers of sign lan- (BDA) if they had any contacts so that guage, how were they taught? Was it a they could refer all these people to sign workshop style teaching or something else? language courses. The BDA turned to the It started with the British Deaf Associa- University of Durham for help, to see if tion asking for people who were interest- together they could deliver a course. ed in coming on a workshop and be Within 3 years there was a university BSL taught how to teach. On that very first Teacher Training course and it all went course Dot visited the group and ex- from there. plained to them how her book could be That teacher training certification then used in the teaching of sign language. enabled deaf people to go on to work as This took place around 1981. Make no sign language teachers. That was the first mistake this was a hugely significant de- BSL teacher training course within a uni- velopment. versity setting. Following this, a new programme ap- What was the content taught on the course? peared on our TV screens which was The first task was to persuade deaf peo- looking at the lives of deaf people. It was ple to come on the course at university. a weekly programme that was broadcast Many deaf people didn’t want to even on BBC1 (See Hear) and had huge expo- apply as they felt they didn’t have the sure as it was watched by many hearing 5.8 UK 115

qualifications that are required for hear- language. ing people to enter a university course. The second concept was that of linguis- We had to inform deaf people that entry tics and an understanding of what that to our courses would be judged by their meant in terms of BSL. How to be able to level of proficiency using BSL, the poten- observe others and learn how to teach. tial to be a leader, a strong sense of Deaf Finally, they would pass assessments in culture. teaching skills; once completed they

The first concept we taught was a sense would graduate from the course. of identity and examining who they Our first BSL teachers graduated in 1985. were; for too long they had been denied The final cohort graduated in 1999 be- their own identity and had been op- cause the university department closed. pressed by hearing people. Once they After 1999 there were different courses could have that sense of who they were delivered in a host of different, often they would be able to stand up for them- piecemeal ways. selves. So we wanted to give them that Date of the interview: September 2016 sense of identity and ownership of their 5.8 UK 116 117

Interview with Emma Iliffe Chairperson of ABSLTA: The Association of BSL Teachers and Assessors

As a result, prospective BSL teachers are What, in your opin- compelled to attend government- ion, are the recognised teaching training courses that strengths and make no specific reference to the unique weaknesses (areas of improvement) of the challenges of teaching BSL, do not in- current system of BSL teacher training in the clude BSL-using lecturers who under- UK? stand the language, and do not include The current system is weak for the simple BSL curricula that students can subse- reason that the majority of the long- quently teach. established teacher training courses A large percentage of the current supply (such as those run by Bristol University, of BSL teachers, who qualified in the Durham University, University of Central 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, is now reaching Lancashire, City Lit), specifically run for retirement age which is leading to a BSL teachers have now closed. This is due shortage of BSL classes to meet local de- to a combination of failure of the British mands. government to give legal status to BSL Alongside this shortage of formally quali- (that would require mandatory provision fied BSL teachers, we are also aware that for BSL classes) plus austerity-driven cuts some unqualified hearing Communica- that has led to higher education budget tion Support Workers with only basic lev- cuts leading to previous BSL training el 1 or 2 signing skills are teaching BSL courses being cut. courses – this is highly inappropriate and While there are still awarding organisa- also discriminating against deaf BSL Tu- tions (such as ABC, the Institute of British tors. Sign Language and Signature) that offer BSL-related courses these do not current- Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ ly include BSL teacher training with for- in your country? mal government OFQUAL-accredited The best examples that we can give is his- qualifications that are nationally recog- toric. At Durham University, in the 1990s, nised by HE and FE institutions. when the School of Deaf Studies there,

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made specific provision to use deaf BSL mandatory register of qualified and ac- using lecturers to teach deaf BSL using credited BSL teachers in order to prevent students and deliver a rigorous academic the use of unqualified cowboy BSL teach- and practical BSL curriculum under- ers. pinned by both linguistics and teaching Can you tell us about the accreditation of practice. sign language teachers in the UK? London’s City Lit Institute was another Ideally, a BSL teacher will have proficien- centre of excellence in BSL teacher train- cy in BSL up to at least Level 3. After they ing that offered OFQUAL-accredited would then seek a generic teaching qual- teacher qualifications. Sadly, due to re- ification at a higher education or skills tirements, failure to train a new genera- institute to a minimum Level 3 Award tion of BSL teacher trainers, and the lack (QCF) to a maximum Level 5 Diploma in of BSL teacher training courses, this aca- Education and Training (QCF) demic rigour and knowledge base is in There are also earlier qualifications with danger of being lost to future genera- names such as DTLLS, CTLLS, PTLLS or tions. 7407 or stage 3, amongst others. The Another issue is that younger deaf peo- qualifications in the FE sector have gone ple are frequently discouraged from tak- through various periods of reform and ing up BSL teacher training due to the these are the earlier versions, which are fact that rules for claiming benefits can generally not available now but still have penalise some workers who work part- relevance where older BSL teachers are time at low rates, resulting in some teaching classes. younger deaf people finding it more eco- nomical to live off benefits than train as a Unfortunately, as noted above, there is tutor. no mandatory register to enforce that The resulting vacuum in formally trained sign language teachers are properly ac- and qualified BSL teachers has led to credited. Communication Support Workers and Can you tell us something about curriculum BSL interpreters taking advantage of a development in the UK? Are curricula for gap in the market to deliver BSL courses training sign language teachers based on themselves - which undermines deaf BSL the CEFR? teachers. The awarding body Signature is currently Given this, there is an urgent need for a responsible for curriculum development 5.8 UK 119

for BSL Levels 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6 (There is no What, in your opinion, is the way forward level 5) and for recruiting the BSL asses- for sign language teaching and the training sors who assess these. of sign language teachers in the UK and in These levels are based on earlier pre- Europe? CEFR standards, using NVQ UK Occupa- A BSL Act that introduces mandatory tional Language Standards (dating from funding in England, Wales, Scotland and 2010) at Levels 1, 2, 3,4 and 6. Northern Ireland for a centrally-funded The Institute of BSL has also produced its deaf-led UK agency that oversees BSL own Levels 1, 2 and 3 BSL curriculum and curriculum development, nationally ac- qualifications. However, these are still credited and recognised teacher training awaiting formal accreditation by the UK qualifications, assessors and registration Skills Agency. (http://ibsl.org.uk/ of BSL teachers. qualifications/#intro-to-qualifications) Date of the interview: April 2017

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Interview with Sarah Lawrence Sarah Lawrence is Deaf, a fluent signer of BSL from Cardiff. She is a successful business woman and owns ‘Deaf- Friendly Solutions’, an in-service training business for deaf and hearing organisations.

and higher level learning. Passion for the What, in your maintenance of BSL standards opinion, are the strengths and weaknesses is definitely missing in some of the more of the current system of BSL teacher training influential trainers, and that is slowly un- in the UK? dermining the BSL teaching framework For some years now, I have found myself across the UK. Friends using friends to having to repair poor signing skills from put on training events, means that the Level 1 and Level 2 classes. The main rea- skills and knowledge of some of the sons behind this : most passionate and accomplished BSL teachers in the UK are wasted. • the lack of effective teaching of the basic linguistic rules of BSL at those Those courses that are offered are also levels; and expensive for self employed deaf teachers with smaller numbers of students. • a lack of teaching passion to teach the language properly. It represents quite a significant overhead. If we are to get serious about help- Training for BSL teachers is scarce, and ing qualified deaf teachers to teach and even where it is available, too much of run courses, we need to make sure the those events concentrate on talking courses that are run are affordable and down to deaf teachers and telling them not run for profit. about the process of teaching rather than a focus on the outcome and student Can you give us examples of ‘best practice’ learning. in your country? This is a tough one, because of the rea- Current teaching provision is usually sons above. Training content has been offered by people who have little or no stale and stagnant for some time, with experience of teaching the introductory too little critical thinking about past levels, where knowledge and application events and creative thinking about how of the basics is essential to the use of BSL BSL teaching can be improved. The

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teaching community see an invasion of ingness to register virtually anyone to hearing teachers with low levels of BSL teach based on a paper application, is and virtually no linguistic knowledge highly damaging. offering courses, but we do nothing to Can you tell us something about curriculum develop the next breed of deaf teachers development in the UK? Are curricula for and look at new methods to teach. training sign language teachers based on There are no national resources as you the CEFR? would get with Geography/French/ The curriculum has remained virtually Psychology for example, and nothing in the same for many years. I believe when the training events that are held, seeks to first set, it would have complied with the change that. Best practice in the UK in CEFR and probably still does. my opinion, is limited to teaching practic- The primary comprehensive teaching re- es themselves, not the teaching of the source has been in existence for many teachers. I also consider this to be a years, and little has changed. If there is a worsening position in the UK, not an im- link made between providers of training proving one. courses for BSL teachers and the CEFR, it Can you tell us about the accreditation of is not made obvious to delegates and sign language teachers in the UK? The problem is that teaching of BSL is un- regulated, so virtually anyone can offer to run BSL courses. Teachers in colleges and universities have to be qualified teachers and are subject to the requirement of obtaining CPD, private providers under the registration of the two awarding bodies, do not need to show qualification status or continued fitness to teach. The process for regulation is far too wool- ly and driven primarily by income, not by the maintenance of teaching standards. For the conscientious, committed and fully qualified deaf BSL teachers, the will-

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none of the paperwork makes any refer- modern foreign language, not just how ence to a link being made. To save our people talk in English, French, Italian etc. language and instill good teaching and when down the pub or at a rugby club. training practices, I believe there is ur- Any national process of ownership of the gent need to professionalise the admin- standards involving oversight and influ- istration that sits behind BSL. ence over the teaching of BSL needs to What, in your opinion, is the way forward be removed from the pursuit of income, for sign language teaching and the training so that decision making is not influenced of sign language teachers in the UK and in by monetary considerations. Europe? Arrogance, selfishness, exploitative atti- I believe there has to be a far greater fo- tudes and the pursuit of power, does cus on standards in respect of training for nothing to help BSL teachers or the teachers and teaching itself. This should maintenance of teaching standards of be underpinned by far greater BSL. knowledge and understanding of BSL lin- We need a cradle to grave national/ guistics, with every teacher and trainer international framework that identifies needing to be qualified in linguistics to talent and provides an affordable and be able to teach/train. deaf friendly development pathway for The BSL teaching community needs to be deaf teachers from the first day on their empowered so that best practices can road to being a qualified teaching/trainer flourish, with a renewed national focus to the time they retire. of all interested bodies concentrating on standards of BSL, and signing outcomes The quality of future training should be of students. underpinned by qualification and contin- There is far too great a focus on paper- uous professional development, and ac- work and written assessments, with cess to all of this should not be restricted many students able to try practical sign- by cost. ing assessments time and again until they finally record one they are happy Date of the interview: April 2017 with. There needs to be in place something that protects and promotes high standards of BSL, so that it is akin to teaching a 5.8 UK 123 Results SignTeach Survey: UK

Number of respondents On average, how many hours do you teach 24. per month? Hearing Status

All of the UK respondents (light blue) are Like their colleagues, most BSL teachers deaf. do not work fulltime. Native signers? Open question: Good examples, advice? “Sign Language teachers should have opportunities to work together, to discuss many issues, and to attend some seminars, courses or conferences for professional developments. we also need an online resource centre to share our teaching experiences and outcomes with 70% of the UK respondents learned to examples, exchange teaching materials, sign after age 3, but almost all before age do some teacher exchange activities, and 20. to support each other.” Age? Open question: Barriers? “Due cutback and zero hours contract.” “Sometimes different cultures have different signs which they find is not suit- able due to their religions” More results can be found on the Sign- Teach website. Compared to their colleagues across Eu- rope, UK BSL teachers (light blue) are older, almost 70% are 40 or older. 5.8 UK 124 125 6. Conclusions & Recommendations

languages, they were not studied or de- In the country reports, you have read scribed. They were ‘owned’ by the users about the history of sign language teach- - people who were deaf from birth - and ing in Europe. The interviews with the ignored, looked down upon or plainly in- experts and the results of the SignTeach visible to everyone outside of the Deaf Survey give useful insights into the pre- community. sent situation. Of course, what we are 2. Sign languages: a hearing owned really interested in, is the future. All peo- communication ‘tool’ ple who we consulted told us about their Then hearing people, usually the clergy concerns for the future. But can we wanting to save deaf ‘souls’, became in- agree on a ‘roadmap’ so that we all go in volved. They used signs as a communica- the same, right direction? tion tool to reach and teach deaf people. First, a bird’s eye view of sign languages They looked at signs from a hearing per- and sign language teaching through the spective: a tool to communicate with ages. Where do we come from? We all deaf people, a tool to teach deaf people seem to be travelling the same road, alt- to read and write the spoken language, hough some countries travel faster than and maybe to speak and lipread. A others. tool to make deaf people and sign 1. Sign languages, deaf-owned languages fit the hearing moulds that ‘undiscovered’ languages were current at the time. Until not so very long ago, sign languages Teachers were ignorant of the syntax and were used within small and larger com- grammar of the sign language as it was munities of deaf people for everyday used by deaf people amongst them- communication. Hearing family mem- selves. Some hearing teachers devel- bers learned sign language from their oped their own sign ‘systems’ to match deaf relatives, deaf children acquired the hearing language – at word-level, sign language informally from deaf peers and sometimes even at the level of mor- and deaf adults. Sign languages were phemes. Literally ignoring the meaning not formally taught as first or foreign of the word and the existing sign lan- 6 126

guage lexicon. The word ‘butterfly’ for Sign language interpreter became a paid instance would be signed as two signs: profession. Before, family members of BUTTER + FLY = flying butter! The word deaf people had interpreted informally; ‘understand’: UNDER + STAND = standing now, interpreting required proper train- under! These examples are often quoted ing, accreditation and registration. to show how ridiculous these attempts Proper training, usually by hearing and were, and how naïve (and patronizing) deaf teachers, teaching in tandem. Deaf the persons who designed these sys- people taught communication and eve- tems. In the country reports, several au- ryday language use, hearing people thors mention ‘sign supported speech taught linguistics, ethics, and other theo- (Signed English, Signed German, Sign retical subjects. In many countries, deaf Supported Dutch, etc.). These sign sup- native signers did not – do not – have ported speech systems are less extreme the qualifications required to teach at examples of how the lexicon of sign lan- higher level education. They were em- guages is used as a ‘tool’ to communi- ployed as teaching assistants, or some cate with deaf people and to teach them other way was found to bypass the miss- the spoken language. ing qualifications. 3. Sign languages: deaf-owned lan- Universities started to research, then guages, discovered and charted by teach sign linguistics. At first by hearing linguists researchers, but slowly but surely also by Hearing linguists, starting with Bernard deaf researchers. Sign languages became Tervoort and William C. Stokoe discov- a respectable research subject. Deaf sign ered the sign languages used within deaf language users became teachers, re- communities and from the 1950’s on searchers, and interpreters, equal to began to describe and study these their hearing colleagues. languages as true explorers. They 4. Sign languages: a ‘reasonable respected sign languages and sign accommodation’ for deaf people, language users. They didn’t try to but at the same time: languages in change or ‘improve’ sign language, but their own right. employed native deaf sign language In most countries of Europe, sign lan- users as informants. Slowly but surely, guages are now seen as equal to spoken sign languages became visible and languages. Maybe not by law, but in respected as equal to spoken practice they are treated as minority lan- languages.

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guages, equal to spoken minority lan- 2. The market for sign language teach- guages. Used on television, in courts, at ing has changed. Fewer parents and universities. Treated as ‘reasonable ac- teachers of deaf children learn to sign, commodation’ whenever accessibility is whereas the general public and hearing at stake, but also taught at all levels of students become more and more inter- education to people who are interested ested. Like sign languages, sign language in sign languages in their own right. teaching has joined the mainstream. As a More and more often, taught by teachers result, the requirements for sign lan- who now have to meet mainstream guage teachers have changed. If not qualification and accreditation criteria (yet) by law, then in daily practice. for teaching languages. However, sign language teachers – again, Sign language curricula now follow main- in general - have NOT changed. In many stream developments and are being re- European countries, the majority of the written to fit the CEFR, with its focus on sign language teachers are 40+, they communication instead of (or in addition have been teaching sign language (in the to) grammar and syntax. same way?) for decades. Quality standards for sign language They find it difficult to meet the needs of teachers, accreditation and registration, the new target groups, of meeting the CPD (continuous professional develop- requirements of mainstream education. ment) are recommended by many of the In most European countries, few young people who we consulted. deaf people are interested in becoming a All is well? sign language teacher. Deaf sign language teachers have NOT joined the So all is well? No. As this report shows, mainstream. Yet. all is not well. We are in the middle of a Because of the ’mainstreaming’ of sign process of change: languages and sign language teaching, 1. The status of sign languages has more and more often sign languages are changed. Sign languages have joined the taught at a remove from the deaf com- mainstream and are now comparable to munity and deaf culture. Teachers may spoken minority languages. If not (yet) be hearing people who learned sign lan- by law, then in daily practice. If not now, guage as a foreign language. The sign then soon. Sign languages are no longer language that is taught may be a the ‘private’ property of the Deaf com- ’standardized’ or ’sanitized’ version of munity. sign language—instead of what Andreas 6 128

Costrau (page 64) calls the BIO version each of our countries. of sign language. In short: sign languages teachers and the The way forward? training of sign language teachers, Many people who we consulted must become mainstream, too. Even though mainstreaming may have ex-pressed their concerns. This is the unwanted side effects, there is no first step, to be aware that all is not way back. well, that action is needed. Fortunately, most peo-ple who we consulted, agree Advocates & Watchdogs on the way forward: Therefore, we also very much need advocates & watchdogs. • We need quality standards, accredita-tion, and registration of Advocates: sign language users, teach- sign language teachers equal to ers, researchers who show the main- what is required for teachers of stream the added value of sign lan- spoken languages in each of our guages for language teaching, for re- countries. search, for life.

• We need training options for sign & lan-guage teachers, both initial Watchdogs: sign language users, sign training and CPD, similar to what is language teachers, sign language re- available to teach-ers of spoken searchers who make sure that joining languages in each of our countries. the mainstream does NOT result in sub- • We need payment and career mersion, or in diluting what is unique to opportuni-ties for sign language sign languages, to sign language users, to teachers, equal to what is available sign language teachers. to teachers of spoken languages in Equal yes, but different too.

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Recommendations So instead, we present you with just one recommendation—or maybe it is a re- We wrote this report for policymakers. quest. Policymakers at EU level, but also at national level. At the last consortium Easy to remember, just 3 words that you meeting of the SignTeach consortium, can use, always and everywhere. partners discussed recommendations. Whenever you say or write anything What can policymakers do, to promote about languages – policy, planning, and support sign languages and sign lan- rights, teaching, legislation, learning, guage learning in Europe, in the EU funding, never mind what – member states? ALWAYS ALWAYS add: We looked at recommendations of earlier projects and initiatives. Many of those … include SIGN LANGUAGES! are still valid! We could have ended this German? Include German Sign Lan- report with many pages filled with rec- guage. Portuguese? Include Portuguese ommendations of earlier projects and Sign Language, etc. experts! Instead, we posted them on a Language learning? website: www.signlanguagewatch.eu. ... Include SIGN LANGUAGES! We also came up with recommendations of our own. The list kept growing, and Language teaching? growing. ... include SIGN LANGUAGES! But we are teachers. We know that poli- Language policy? cymakers are busy, have little time and short attention spans. We know that ... Include SIGN LANGUAGES! long lists are not effective.

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Say it to yourself, or better yet, say it out loud. Add a note or correction to each text or memorandum about languages that you are asked to review, approve or sign: … include SIGN LANGUAGES! Please repeat? Please remember?

… include SIGN LANGUAGES!

6 131 SignTeach Consortium

Belgium European Union of the Deaf (EUD), Brussels Mark Wheatly, Petra Soderquist, Frankie Picron, David Hays

KU Leuven, Antwerpen Myriam Vermeerbergen, Kristof de Weerdt, Carolien Dog- gen

Czech Republic Pevnost – České centrum znakového jazyka, o. s., Prague Radka Novakova, Vladimír Šimon

Germany Universität Hamburg, Hamburg Christian Rathmann, Stefan Goldschmidt, Simon Kollien Hochschule Magdeburg-Stendal FH, Magdeburg Sabine Fries, Thomas Finkbeiner, Jens Hessmann

Iceland Samskiptamiðstöð heyrnarlausra og heyrnarskertra, Reykjavik Júlia Hreinsdóttir, Uldis Ozols

Italy Siena School for Liberal Arts, Siena Miriam Grottanelli de Santi, Pia Rizzi

The Nether- Pragma, Hoensbroek (main contractor) lands Liesbeth Pyfers Signhands, Zaandam Joni Oyserman

Norway Statped, Trondheim Aud Karin Stangvik, Uni Helland, Olle Eriksen

United Kingdom University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), Preston Lynne Barnes, Luigi Lerose, Clark Denmark