Back to School and the ASL Sign for "Smart"

This season has flown by like a whirlwind. The first part of summer was spent driving the B. Bear around to summer playground activities. The second part was spent planning our vacation of two weeks on the West Coast. Now we come to the end of summer...and that means it's time to prepare to go back to school.

The B. Bear will be in third grade this year, half way through elementary school. Where does the time go? He starts eight days from now, and I think we're both quite ready for him to be back in class. (Yes, we are both counting the days down.)

I am planning to continue my own college education starting in January. I lost such a huge degree of my hearing when I got sick while attending school decades ago, I could no longer function in class. We did not have the technology we do today, nor the resources for deaf people back then where I was living to make it possible for someone like me to attend classes. I became depressed and did not return to school. It was a very dark time in my life. That's all I have to say about that.

Times have changed since then, and with the help of an ASL interpreter provided by the college in class with me, I'm feeling quite positive of completing my degree. I need 62 credits for this particular degree, and I have 55 behind me. I was going for an Associates in Applied Sciences in Human Services back then. This time, I'm looking at something in Social Services and Advocacy. I have some writing, math, psychology, gerontology and Human Services courses behind me, but I don't know how many of my credits can be applied toward a Social Services degree. I particularly want to take Deaf Studies, but there are no classes in that field available in our current community. Perhaps when Fabulous Husband retires we can move someplace where I can pick those up, someplace back near the West Coast. In the meantime, I have a lot to do to prepare for the classes that ARE available here this winter.

I want to mention for people who desire to attend classes who are deaf, hard of hearing, or losing their hearing, there is another option available besides an ASL interpreter. CART services (real time captioning) is available if that is preferred.  @JBHORSLEY over on Twitter was telling me that this service has been wonderful for him. When the professor is speaking, the stenographer types, "professor" and when a student is asking a question, "student" is typed. This way he knows who is speaking. At the end of the day, he gets an email from the stenographer or typist (I don't remember which phrase he used) and in that email is the COMPLETE transcript from everything that was said in his classes that day. That makes a wonderful study tool for him and he doesn't need a note taker.

Not only am I preparing to return to school, I'm working on obtaining new hearing aids. There is also a blue tooth amplifier that is built into a clipboard that I would like to get. The professors or instructors wear a small wireless mic on their lapel or collar which transmits their voice into the amplified clipboard which sends the voice directly into the hearing aids. How cool is that? Of course, I need the new hearing aids with blue tooth technology in order to use one of these.

The website is here Harris Communication and this is what it looks like:







Here is a lovely Signing Time video of Rachel and friends signing "smart". Learn more about Signing Time's Class Room Edition at the bottom of this page.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSUgQBot2SE&feature=results_main  Learn more about Rachel and Signing Time at http://www.signingtime.com   There are some GREAT Back To School savings going on right now. My personal favorite and recommendation that the Kindergarten children LOVE is Class Room Edition  It comes with 16 weeks of lessons, lesson plans and activities and DVD's. The themes cover wonderful topics from the Alphabet to the Zoo (A-Z). We start each year off with "Welcome to School".