Sorry for the bad drawing, some kids in my class did it at us but wouldn’t explain what it meant. You put your hand against the side of your head with three fingers, and then wave sideways outward.

Hi all. Can anyone tell me what this sign means? The curved shape bounced twice on the index finger. I can't make it out from the context of what I was watching.
Thanks!

https://preview.redd.it/g11lpur3m7he1.png?width=236&format=png&auto=webp&s=edd6e2b050cd06831883889c5f064a7c35ad46c3

is the sign for dreadlocks and Senegalese twists the same?

Hi all! I am learning ASL and while I have a pretty solid handle of grammar and a decent sized vocabulary, I find myself having difficulties understanding when other people are signing to me. I get lost if they're not being very slow and clear with their signs, which just isn't how real conversations look. I am hoping to find some Deaf youtubers who vlog or make content in ASL to practice understanding sign and to immerse myself in the language more.

So with that being said, who are some of your favorite Deaf youtubers who post content in ASL?

Two people (one I decided to intentionally add links) have made posts asking for short but complex videos to be translated for free.

We all have bills to pay and the work of people who do this should be respected by compensating them so they can continue supporting us. It is hard to work - even if you have a job - when you're homeless and hungry, thus having to focus more on basic needs than you should have to.

Short length of videos does not necessarily correlate to less complexity.

Hello! Could anyone help me translate 15 seconds worth of ASL? Its for a video I'm editing and i want to add text so that hearing folk can understand too :)

For K-12 ASL educators teaching in New York State

If you are an American Sign Language teacher working in a K-12 setting in New York State, we invite you to complete a confidential and voluntary form to help us build a comprehensive database of ASL teachers across the state.

The NYSED ASL Steering Committee is dedicated to supporting and enhancing ASL education in New York. Our goal is to connect educators like you with valuable resources, including professional development opportunities and webinars, that will strengthen ASL teaching in the K-12 environment.

By completing this form, you’ll be added to a contact list for important updates on ASL-related webinars, resources, and professional development opportunities. Additionally, you can opt-in to receive communications from NYSED about ASL education.

Link to form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeWyg8f319DVvLWxBx4xNWu_cojM0mlUTVed_-Y3cjMwcRkHw/viewform?usp=sf_link

Please also forward this form to any other ASL teachers in your district or network, so we can ensure all K-12 ASL educators are included.

Thank you for your participation and support in helping us create a stronger network of ASL educators in New York!

Best regards,

NYSED ASL Steering Committee

My son is 4, I’ve used ASL often since he was born - I accompany common sentences with signs and he has learned a lot, but I have run into a wall as far as how to use his name.

I could spell it out, but I didn’t know if it was typical to use a shorter sign for your son or how “naming” someone works in general. I don’t want him to confuse the sign for “son” as his name if it’s not common.

any advice would be appreciated!

It just opened today and it'd be cool to have a study/accountability buddy.

Am hearing, My wife (VI teacher, also hearing, but ASL could be useful tool)

We have both started trying to learn together… not crazy serious… but one step at a time

We have purchased a couple different resources and also frequently look at various online,

And occasionally we have very conflicting information, more than “more than than one way to sign this”

What’s the general advice for when you get conflicting information?

We have been trying when it comes up to look at a variety and go with what is more common

Thoughts?

Is it ok if I make up sign language/asl for me and my deaf friend like can I make up some signs that aren't actual sign language to help communicate with my deaf friend? She finds it hard use real asl so that's why I want to create signs that will be easier for her to use to communicate with me.

I don't mean to seem rude if I did xx

I recently graduated from my ITP and am looking for interpreting jobs. One thing i have yet to find is a friend to sign with, of course I've signed with my local Deaf community and interpreters but it is extremely hard to relate to and be friends with people that are your parents and grandparents age. 😅 My local Deaf community is also not very active, we don't even have regular coffee chats. I just want some friends to sign with about stuff im actually interested in.

edit: this isnt about interpreting jobs its about communicating in asl for skill retention

i want to ask my ASL instructor for any recommendations for a film about a specific topic, but i’m not sure how to structure the phrase. i don’t know if the word “ABOUT” is necessary here, or if that’s too englishy of a translation. should i sign something like “MOVIE ABOUT (THING) YOU RECOMMEND-TO-me PLEASE”?

thank you in advance!

I am wondering how I would sign “there is no money on the account” or “no money/no funds”

I am confused on the grammar of this so any opinions would help!!

So I want to talk to my asl teacher and tell him about how my sister and I were studying together, but I don't really know how to say "my sister and I" and then also having to refer to ourselves later in the conversation.

I thought it would be "PAST NIGHT -- MY SISTER (point to a place to establish her) -- I -- WE (using the TWO handshape and moving it back and forth) -- STUDY -- TOGETHER" but I'm really just guessing. I think the WE would act as a way to establish who I'm talking about when I'm referring to both of us later in the convo?

I would really appreciate if someone could affirm/correct this :)

Hi everyone! As a mom, educator, and someone deeply passionate about creating inclusive children's media, I'm doing some research to better understand the needs of Deaf and Hard of Hearing kids when it comes to TV shows.

What do you think is missing from children's TV for Deaf kids?

Would you love to see more ASL, Deaf characters, or Deaf culture? •

Are there specific features, themes, or stories you think would benefit your child? ?

What's something you wish existed to make TV more inclusive and meaningful for your family?

Your feedback will help guide ideas for research and development in this area, so it would mean so much if you shared your thoughts! Let's work toward making children's programming better for all kids. Feel free to comment or send me a DM! S & Share

Hello! I know people on here don't like homework help but I'm stuck. The video is describing a pair of sunglasses and were suposed to describe the size, shape, colors, and details of them.

This is the link: https://youtu.be/MKi10PhUT3I?si=opRRaMiZs7NHue62

I get that they're round lenses/frames but I'm not sure what the sign is after describing the shape and before he describes metal the bridge of the glasses when he points to his cheek and shakes his fist while moving it away. (Timestamp 0:10 because my screen recording of it disappeared when I tried posting it)

hi guys, kind of a weird request.

for context: im work in special education, and one of my students is almost fully deaf. while he's very young + has a few developmental conditions he's super bright and knows 20-30 signs well already.

ive been trying to work with him on spelling his name, but his name is quite long and he gets quite frustrated trying to perfectly make the hand gestures for every letter. i don't know much about the deaf community but i do know people frown upon hearing people assigning sign names for themselves or others, is there any way to give him a proper sign name he can use to call himself in a respectful way?

his parents are against taking him to any sort of deaf school/communities/activities (they consider him nonverbal and want to teach him english) and limit his engagement with sign to pretty much just our classroom, so there's no way he has a sign name already. of course im against this + working on getting them a tour of a deaf/hh school to try and change their minds but in the meantime id like him to be able to have some level of functional communication.

is there any respectful way to give this kiddo a sign name, like paying someone online to create one, going to some sort of community event, asking at the school for the deaf, ect? thanks guys in advance!

Hello!! I recently signed up to volunteer in an ESL tutoring program. I learned the other day that I’m going to be tutoring a student in ESL III and that his first language is ASL. Forgive my ignorance, would that indicate that English reading and writing was taught to this student later in life potentially and that’s why he’s in ESL? Or am I thinking about it too hard and there is another scenario that I’m not considering?

Appreciate any insight as I want to ensure I approach the situation with the right perspective and understanding to best tutor the student!

https://reddit.com/link/1ifirhs/video/xvup3lxcwlge1/player

Hi everyone! An assignment in my ASL 3 class is to sign a (non-controversial, non-political) news story in ASL for 2-3 minutes, and I was hoping some people here could watch this video and give me some feedback on what I could do to improve my vocab/grammar/sentence structure. The link to the article is here, and I'll put the English transcript below. Thanks in advance! (I'm a little nervous to show my face online and have this account connected to me, so after I receive some feedback, I'm probably going to delete this post.)

TRANSCRIPT: What's my news story about? Eight years ago, a man named Paul lost his dog named Damian. What happened? In 2017, Paul and his family were moving from Massachusetts to Arizona. At a rest stop in Oklahoma, the dog ran away because something scared him. Paul and his family searched for a week, but they couldn't find him. Years passed, but Paul never stopped searching. One day in Oklahoma City, a woman was in her car when she had to swerve to avoid something. It turned out to be a small, brown dog. She picked him up and took him to the vet. Paul and his wife, who were still living in Arizona, were driving up to LA to give clothes to help with the wildfires. While Paul was driving, he got a text on his Apple Watch that said, "Your dog, Damian, has been found." The two of them drove 16 hours to Oklahoma City where Paul and Damian were reunited at last.

So I’m relatively new to learning asl (been learning for about 2 months) and am really enjoying learning, I have a general grasp of it as well as its grammar rules, but I had a question, specifically about questions in the middle of a thought. I study online and see a lot of sentences structured as something along the lines of “MY DAY GOOD, WHY? ME PLAY BASEBALL” it feels awkward for me to form a sentence that way and I don’t really see it being used outside of the lessons. So I was wondering, when/how often is that sentence structure used in the Deaf community? And if not, how alternately should the sentence be constructed?

Hi r/asl! We're a group of hearing computer science students working on a hackathon project, and we'd love input from the ASL community.

We're exploring a browser extension that would:

• Split your screen when watching online videos
• Show the original video on one side
• Show an AI-generated ASL avatar on the other side
• Work with any online video you're watching

We're planning to use AWS's GenASL technology, which creates ASL avatars from a dataset of real ASL signers. This would be for content that doesn't already have human interpreters available.

Before we build anything, we want to hear from ASL users, interpreters, and learners:

1. How do you currently watch/understand online videos without ASL interpretation? What works and what's frustrating?
2. What types of online content do you most wish had ASL interpretation available?
3. What makes a good video ASL interpretation? What makes a bad one? (Considering things like signing space, clarity, flow)
4. If you could magically add ASL interpretation to any online video, when would you use it and why?
5. What would make you trust (or not trust) automated ASL interpretation?

We understand there are many complexities around ASL interpretation that we may not be aware of as hearing developers. We want to ensure anything we create respects ASL as a language and the Deaf community. Your expertise, concerns, and insights would be incredibly valuable.

Edit: Updated post to clarify that we're using AI-generated avatars based on AWS's GenASL technology, not live interpreters or pre-recorded videos

I wanna be correct when signing to people but i know that facial expression help with the context. What different expressions do you use when asking a question or asking “who” a person is? Genuine question i don’t want to look crazy when signing things emotionless.

ETA: WOW you all have sent a clear message... thank you! The best thing for me to do is learn to fully express myself in ASL. After all ASL is fully capable of expressing whatever is I have to say. It is my own limitations that make me want to "slip in" some English words. So [note to self] study on : -). Thank you all for your kindness.

So, ASL and English share many things, including much of the same vocabulary. But would it be a mistake for me to assume that I can use (fingerspell) "any" English word and think it would be understood in ASL.

Here is why I'm asking. I want to say that I liked living in Kentucky because it had many beautiful roads where I could ride my bike and enjoy the bucolic verdant vistas. [yes, this is for homework tho now I'm just curious to know]

So, if I were saying this in German and used bucolic and verdant I wouldn't expect them to know those English words... why, because English and German are different languages. Well, ASL and English are "related" languages... but they too, are in truth, different languages.

So, what do you think... is it ok to use "English" words rather than stick to true ASL vocabulary (whatever those two words would translate to in ASL, I'm not even sure).

Thank you Jeff

Hello!

I am trying to figure out what age it is best to begin teaching my child ASL. My husband, child, and I are all hearing, but it is very important to me that any children we have learn ASL in order to communicate with and allow more accessibility for deaf and HoH populations.

I know that it can be taught from infancy, but we only taught him a few signs as a baby, and I am wanting him to fully learn ASL. He is currently three years old and still learning a lot of things for the first time. For example, he only knows a handful of his letters, but knows all of his shapes, colors, etc.

Any suggestions? I want it to be a positive experience and want to start him at the right time so he enjoys it and also is eager to learn.

TIA!

https://youtu.be/zxNAEQymWsE?si=JJVqOpXEakE0xbIt

This was a fun video that popped up on my feed! Here is Bill Vicars from Lifeprint.com unboxing and describing a webcam. It doesn’t sound exciting but I thought it was very interesting. 👍

As a beginner, this was really cool to see how signing can work when describing something that you’re actually holding in your hand. I am nowhere near being able to do that but it was so interesting to see how he signed around it and even worked it into some of the signs.

And of course I always appreciate his humor…most definitely the correct response to complicated packaging!

(There are captions available so those of us at a low level can follow along.)