Our caseloads of deaf/hard of hearing students are very diverse and no one student is ever the same. As our world continues to change to be more inclusive (in many ways), it is important to acknowledge that our diverse caseloads probably also include queer deaf students. June is Pride Month, and our team at The Online Itinerant wanted to share some resources and ideas for being an ally to the queer deaf community and educate educators that may not be familiar with things like pronouns. Let’s start with the basics. Here, Chella Man and Nyle Dimarco share what it is like being queer and deaf for them. Nyle Dimarco and Chella Man on Being Queer and Deaf | Them.

Queer Signs
Rogan Shannon on YouTube shared a great video on queer signs if you would like to educate yourself. Here’s another from Chella Man and Nyle Dimarco.

Pronouns
ASL does not have gendered pronouns, but in English, many people (queer or not) have begun sharing pronouns when they introduce themselves, along with...

It's the end of the school year!  Not to mention, Better Speech and Hearing Month......

It's the end of the school year!  This is the time of the year when it's tricky to pull students from their classes to work on any skills with them.   I'm competing with beautiful weather, movie days, concert practice, fun end-of-the-year projects and other activities.  Planning my sessions with students this time of the year takes careful coordination with teachers to make sure I'm not overlapping a field trip or other special classroom activity.

To keep their time with me motivating and fun, this is the perfect opportunity to reinforce ear anatomy through my Edible Ear Lesson.  My students LOVE this activity!  I never get a complaint about pulling them when this is the plan for the day.

For schools that house multiple students on my caseload, this is the perfect end-of-the-year party.  I can easily pull multiple students from a variety of grades to do...

Education is something that everyone should have access to, regardless of hearing (or any disability!). If we want deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) students to be successful, one strategy is to use Universal Design for Learning (UDL), which provides strategies that make learning accessible to ALL students, including students who are deaf or hard of hearing. These are great strategies to utilize not only because it is all inclusive and guards against students feeling singled out, but also can be a great way to facilitate buy-in from teachers, so that they recognize that by supporting their DHH student in this way, they are actually supporting all the students in their classroom.  Because, after all, accessibility goes beyond the visual and auditory access and includes changes in the classroom instruction and the space itself.  

So, how do we make our classrooms more accessible? How can we incorporate Universal Design for Learning (UDL) into our classroom...