English 311,"Introduction
to Linguistics"
Visual Phonics
The First Step for Deaf Child to Learn Sound, Decode Words and
Read out Loud
Have you ever been confronted with a situation in which a child is asking
you, "Why is God not fair?" This incident happened to me five years
ago when I was talking to one of my students.
He said to me with a very unclear, monotonous, loud tone, "Ask God why I
am deaf? Ask him now why he made me this way. Ask him why I can not talk."
He was upset because he was not able to produce a word, and he did not want
to continue drilling it. My student had been deaf since birth and had started
taking speech classes since he was one year old. He was first introduced to a
Parent-Infant program where a group of specialists, teachers, and parents worked
together to develop a special intervention plan and where he spent three years
of his life. The main goal of this program was to teach him awareness of sounds.
When he was four years old, he was placed in a hearing impaired class. At this
time, the same group of specialists had created an Individual Educational Plan (I.E.P),
which covered different areas of education. The goals in the I.E.P. were divided
into four areas: math, reading, writing and speech. Of course, speech was the
class he hated the most since he was deaf. During this period, he was introduced
to visual phonics, the extraordinary method of which gave him the opportunity to
learn to how to decode words, how to write those words in English, and how to
use his voice by reading the words out loud. Additionally, he also learned how
to comprehend the meaning of words.
In research study on the "Psycholinguistic Behavior of Deaf
children," Sandra R. Cohen writes about teachers who work with deaf
students. These teachers seem to think that deafness is a great handicap to a
child’s language development. They state, "It is well known that deafness
has a profound effect on a child’s language development. Their vocabulary
lacks the richness and flexibility … specially in words expressing abstract
concepts … writing and reading skills" (27). However, these effects are
not obstacles for a deaf child in developing language. That they are deaf does
not mean they are incapable of learning new strategies that will help them
improve their weakness. In fact, visual phonics has been created to help deaf
children with their writing and reading skills. This program gives the deaf
child an opportunity to learn how to use their voice, how to communicate with
the hearing world, and how to expand their language.
In this paper, I will present the steps that are important to follow in order
to teach phonics to a deaf child. I will focus on the problems that every single
child has to confront when he/she is learning to read and write. The purpose is
to present a program that will help teach deaf students to understand and decode
written words using Visual Phonics. The first part of my paper concentrates on a
child’s general need to understand the differences existing between the sounds
and the names of the letters of the alphabet. Secondly, I will talk about how
human beings gain their knowledge. I present the Visual Phonic System as the
process that helps a deaf child to connect the characters that represent the
sounds and the symbols to the letters in the alphabet. Finally, I will set some
conclusions that will help teachers understand another way to teach phonics.
A few years ago, the University of Oregon conducted a study and found that a
lack of ability in phonics is the most crucial problem in a young person
learning to read. The child needs to understand the difference existing between
the name of the letter and the sound of that letter; an example could be the
letter "a" as in "ant" and "ape." The same letter
represents a single sound and a diphthong sound. Different letters can represent
the same sound as in "Sandy" and "Cindy." A
single sound is spelled with a combination of letters as in "boot"
and "shark." Therefore, phonics is important for reading and
writing. A student introduced to the phonics system usually becomes a fluent
reader when he is able to decode words correctly and rapidly. Jeffery Cantrell
says, "Students became fluent readers when they develop automatcity with a
large number of words … improve reading comprehension … since children are
no longer struggling with decoding words, they can devote their full mental
energies to make meaning from the text" (247). Sandra R. Cohen could have
researched more about what University of Oregon did in order to prove her point.
Then, she could have showed those teachers who work with deaf children that the
lack of writing and reading skills are not just because the students are deaf.
This is a problem that children confront when learning to read and write.
Phonics has a very close relationship with the linguistics process in that
articulation plays a major role in sound production. For example, a child needs
to know the position of articulators in the vocal tract when producing certain
sounds. Moreover, the child needs to be aware of the different sounds of the
letters if they are voiced "b" or voiceless "p."
Furthermore, they need to know where the place of articulation is; to illustrate
the Bilabial "b" and "p" are consonants that are produced by
bringing both lips closer together, and obstructing the air stream completely in
the oral cavity makes the stop consonants "b" and "p." The
manner of articulation tells the child how the air stream is adjusted by the
vocal tract to produce the sound. Consequently, teachers should become familiar
with linguistic rules and should understand why and how those forms are
produced, all of which will help teachers develop the points and manners of
articulation and the chronological development of the speech sounds occurring in
a language.
Speech sounds can be classified by the way in which they are produced.
"Vowels, for the most part, are mastered early and are generally found not
to be defective" (Witnitz 58). Vowels can be classified as front, central
and medial depending of the position of the jaw, tongue, and lips. Vowels are
also divided by their intensity; consequently, they can be classified as high
mid or low pitch. The vowel "i," a high vowel, is produced with a
small portion of the mouth open because the tongue is placed high. The vowel
"o," a low vowel, is produced with the front of the mouth open and the
tongue lowered. Consonants are divided into three groups: point of articulation,
type of articulation, and voiceless or voiced. It is important that an educator
recognize that vowels, consonants, tone, and pitch are not considered important
unless they are standing by themselves. It makes a difference when consonants
represent the sign of a specific language and become sounds. The basic
grammatical process of elements in a language, the sequence of sounds can form
short words by using consonant vowel consonant (CVC) combinations, but other
sounds can be long. Teachers can explain this process to students in a simple
form at the appropriate moment, which help students clarify and organize their
understanding of English spelling patterns.
The alphabet is a set of visual characters in which each figure is a
representation of a sound. During the learning process, a child must be taught
how to decode the alphabet’s characters and must therefore be able to
recognize, for example, what the character "a" stands for. A child
also needs to learn how to associate these characters with their respective
sounds when presented with either the character or the sound. These processes
help a child become an expert in handling written language. As the child gains
experience in the transitions of associating an alphabet’s character with its
sounds, he becomes less aware of this process, therefore making this process
more and more automatic. It is important to recognize that before this happens
the child must master the connection between language that is heard and language
that is seen. Phonics helps children identify written words by pronouncing the
sounds of each letter associated with the written word. When the child is
spelling a word, he is not producing the name of the letter; instead of that
technique, the child is giving the sound of the letter, and he is blending the
sounds at the same time, all the sounds giving meaning of the words he is trying
to read. A strategy teaching children to decode written words into sounds,
phonics helps develop the association between the character and its sound.
Human beings gain their knowledge primarily through the use of all of the
sensory systems, the three most important of which for learning are sight,
touch, and hearing. Usually one or two of these sensory systems is dominant over
the other. An individual can express frustrations when a sense that is primarily
used to learn a new task is not well developed. This is the situation of a deaf
child who is being taught to associate a character with its sound using phonics,
a program focusing on hearing how the written word is pronounced. It is
important to recognize that a deaf child will learn this association faster if
his/her dominant sensory systems are used. Visual phonics is unique in that it
uses sight and motor skills as the main senses in learning how to associate a
character with its sound. In visual phonics, a character is given a hand gesture
that mimics the manner in which the mouth should move when pronouncing the sound
that is associated with that character. A deaf child is able to visualize the
manner in which his/her mouth should move and is also able to associate a
tactile representation with a sound. This process gives the deaf child the
opportunity to make the connection between the character representing the sound
and the symbol, which represents the letter of the alphabet.
For anyone who is learning to write or speak English, the language could get
confusing. This process of learning is more confusing to those who are deaf.
Visual phonics has been created to help children that have problems with aural
comprehension. Teaching deaf children to learn how to use their voice and
communicate with the hearing world, this program could be used effectively for
family members or any person who wants to help a deaf child to communicate.
Visual Phonics allows a deaf child to understand the connection that exists
between a symbol and the sound of each letter of the alphabet.
Visual phonics is a system that uses forty-six written symbols and forty-six
hands movements representing each letter of the alphabet. Each written symbol is
a visual representation of a hand movement. This written symbol and the
simultaneous movement of the hand help the deaf child make the connection
between written and spoken language. Each hand movement makes a visual
connection of the sound that should be produced for each letter of the alphabet.
For example, the hand movement that represents the /t/ is made by flicking
together the thumb and index finger. With a simultaneous movement, the tip of
the tongue is placed at the posterior part of the front top teeth to produce the
dental occlusive sound. The priority of visual phonics is to focus on the sounds
of language. In visual phonics, each written symbol always represents the same
sound. Visual Phonics helps the deaf child to decode the sound by seeing and
feeling it. Millie, a mother of four deaf children, says " Visual Phonics
puts in perspective not just the written form of language but the real power of
language, which is sound" (1).
Visual phonics should be incorporated into the deaf curriculum at an early
age. This program should begin to be taught in the Parent Infant Program,
kindergarten, and the first grade. Teachers should familiarize themselves with
the system since there are different steps that a teacher needs to follow in
order to teach visual phonics. The first step is the movement and should produce
the sounds at the same time. With this procedure, the teacher will reinforce the
sound that the child already knows and will also be teaching the child new
sounds. The teacher should always have a positive attitude and should reinforce
the successes of the student. When the student produces a wrong sound, he should
return to a sound he already knows and the student should be praised for
producing the correct sound. Using a different approach, the teacher should
introduce the new sounds again while encouraging the child to do the hand
movement belonging to the new sound. With this procedure, the child will be able
to associate the relationship existing between the written hand-sound symbols
and the letter. The final goal is for the student to produce the sound and hand
movements. This step is very important because it will help reinforce the
concept and knowledge of each letter of the alphabet. By doing this procedure,
the child will be able to understand the difference between the name of the
letter and the sound of it. As soon as the student shows knowledge of a few
sounds, the teacher should introduce the concept of the word, phrase and
sentence. The teacher should be aware if the child understands the meaning of
the words; this will help the child construct meaningful sentences. When the
child has been taught to generalize the rules of Visual Phonics, he will not use
the visual Phonics symbols anymore. The student will then use Visual Phonics
only when he does not know how to produce a word.
Visual phonics focuses on the sounds of the word before the rules of grammar
become too confusing. Once this system is learned, it can be incorporated into
different programs such as reading, writing, or speech therapy. One of the
programs in which visual Phonics should be incorporated after it has been
learned is the program of Doctor Daniel Ling. Dr. Ling is well-known Speech
Pathologist who created a program to help hearing-impaired children to develop
spoken language. His theory can be difficult to put into practice if it is
introduced to a student that does not know how to produce sounds, but if Visual
Phonics is incorporated with the Ling program the results are incredible. The
knowledge of the caustic of language and the understanding of the audiogram are
very valuable instruments that help teach phonics to a deaf person. But it is
indispensable to know that these areas are not the ones that will help a student
develop reading skills. Daniel Ling says "Speech can be only meaningful
when it is used in communication … one can help a child to develop certain
sounds outside the context of language … but spoken and written language never
develop from such activity along" (3).
There are different areas that a deaf child should be developing while he or
she is learning to produce words, phrases and sentences. Daniels Ling divides
these areas in phonetic and phonological level vocalization. The phonetic level
is divided into voice patterns, diphthongs, vowels, consonants, vowels with /r/,
voiceless and voiced consonants. The phonological level is a divided into words,
phrases and sentences levels. The first step in this program is vocalization;
this vocalization can be imitated or spontaneous. The sounds can be interpreted
at the phonological level if the child gives them a meaning when he is
communicating. An example of this meaning is when he gets hurt and says "ow."
When vocalization is made, the child will learn how to produce basic patterns or
voice, which will help him construct and produce a word. In this step, a child
learns to control his voice using the voice patterns of duration, intensity, and
frequency. In each pattern, it is possible to use a visual guide that will
motivate the child. For instance, in a voice pattern, the child needs to sustain
a vocalization for at last three seconds (say Ba as you draw your finger on this
line. _______________). Gross control of intensity allows the child to produce a
brief, loud utterance (scream) followed by a brief quiet utterance using his
normal voice and whisper.
When the child has mastered the first step of voice patterns, he is ready to
go to the next step where he will be encouraged to produce long vowels and
diphthongs. Simultaneously, the child will be introduced to the phonological
level of diphthongs and vowels. He will be able to read familiar words phrases
and sentences. In order to master the phonetic level the teacher needs to follow
these steps: 1) Produce consonants with a vowel: pa. 2) Repeat twelve short
syllables containing at a rate of at least three per second: pa pa pa pa pa pa
pa pa pa pa pa pa. 3) Rapidly alternate twelve syllables: ba boo ba boo ba boo
ba boo ba boo ba boo ( Fite 3-9).
In conclusion, as we know, teaching language to a deaf child is not easy
work. Therefore, the success of the child depends on a high level of interest
from the family members and from a group of dedicated professionals. The child
needs to understand how to connect visual sound symbols with its corresponding
printed letter. Visual Phonics and the program of Doctor Daniel Ling are two
multi-sensory systems which provide a deaf child with the opportunity of
learning the oral language and of having the ability to write and read. We
can’t forget that there are different approaches for teaching a deaf child to
communicate, one of which is sign language. This system helps a deaf child but
limits him from communicating with the hearing world. Visual Phonics is an easy
program to learn. These techniques are simple to understand and manipulate. All
of the effort put into learning how to use this program and then teaching it to
a student will be well worth it once the child is able to not only write but
also read using his/her voice.