Welcome to our video of the Increasing STEM Signing Knowledge of Undergraduate Student Interpreters project! We hope watching it is both useful and informative. Please join the Discussion and let us know what you noticed, found interesting or valuable, enjoyed or learned.

Judy Vesel, Principal Investigator; M. Diane Clark, Co-principal Investigator, Tara Robillard, Lead Researcher

This is absolutely amazing and I actually cannot believe I have just stumbled upon this. I have just earned a bachelors degree in marine biology, and about 9 months ago started an interpreter program. I fully intend to finish the program and become an interpreter but I was thinking endlessly about how I could combine it with my science background, especially with the lack of signs for more specific biological terms. I would love to learn more about this and get involved in some way if that is possible. 

Andrea: Thank-you for the note. We are always looking for practitioners who are interested in working with us. I've added your name to our database and will contact you in the near future as our work proceeds. You can also check our Signing Math & Science Facebook page for postings about our research needs.

Interpreters with backgrounds like yours are a plus at the college level where deaf students are in hearing universities and taking STEM content.  Get certified and consider that kind of opportunity.

Very exciting project! Warmest congratulations. How do you choose what to add to the Signing Bioscience Dictionary? Would you be open to including additional terms relevant to statistics education? 

Lisa: We have a complex process for selecting terms. In a nutshell it involved identifying terms used in Campbell Biology, the text used in Lamar's undergraduate introductory biology course, identifying those that were incorporated into one of our signing dictionaries, and including terms that were needed for understanding the meaning of terms. This version of the BSD is a prototype. We have an extensive preliminary list of additional terms to include in a subsequent version. We are interested in expanding this list to include additional categories such as  terms relevant to statistics.

How have you collaborated with the Deaf community to determine the agreed-upon sign for these terms? 

Excellent question.  

Yes, as any deaf related research must include deaf collaborators.  One member was accidentally left off of this presentation.  Dr. Amber Marchutt has a background in biology and has taught science in the classroom.  Dr. Katie Cue worked with us as well as Amber on identifying the correct way to sign these terms. Katie has also taught science to deaf children.

naturally it is always a work in progress.  Prior to COVID 19 we were planning to change some signs, again based on collabortion with deaf researchers.

What an interesting and important research project!  I am sharing this video with a student of mine who is studying ASL on her own and plans to go to graduate school in the sciences.  Thank you so much for sharing your work!

You might be interested in my team's presentation as well.  While we do not focus explicitly on accessibility of STEM educational materials, we are using 3D-printed solids in multivariable calculus as a way for students to engage physically with the mathematical concepts.  And your video reminds me that we need to be more intentional about making the educational materials that we develop accessible to a broad community of learners.

Monica: Thank-you for sharing our work with your student. I'll take a look at your video.

Thank you for this very meaningful contribution!

Is an implication of this work that there is a need for discipline-specific dictionaries (for computer science, mechanical engineering, etc.) as well as discipline-specific training?

I think you have made an important point.  I know that several different groups are working on developing discipline-specific corpuses (is that the plural--checked and it can be or corpora--learned something!) This need is driven by the exciting increase in the number of deaf individuals entering into diverse fields.  As technology increases access, deaf individuals have more opportunities.

I would like to add that we need to do additional research to identify how to organize the next iteration of the SBD and create other signing dictionaries that incorporate terms, definitions, and illustrations from other disciplines. Our ongoing research and development will likely incorporate many of the signs for terms being developed by other groups and examine the the training that is needed.

This is just wonderful. Any plans to scale this up to math and chemistry etc?

This is such a great project, Judy. And it reveals how important this type of resource and study for and on interpreters is for science learning in all settings. Thank you!

What a great project

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1You've made a fine contribution to STEM education that will help both hearing-impaired students and their interpreters.Not surprising that the students often couldn't keep up with the speed of the lecture. Just as with a foreign language, there needs to be pre-teaching of the relevant vocabulary and students practicing making the signs they will see before they view the lecture. I think the video might be improved by showing best practices of using these wonderful new tools with a class that includes deaf or hearing -impaired students.

Very informative and professionally produced video.  Super work by TERC and Dr. Clark and her colleagues and students at Lamar.  This is important work that has potential to significantly benefit those with speech and hearing impairments in the sciences. 

Thanks Randall

it is great working with you as the subject matter expert and the students really learned a great deal of biology!

In terms of best practices, this may be helpful. 

At UMBC all of our Deaf students are studying computer science, engineering, biology, and chemical engineering. We have an inhouse dictionary of signs we have used and links to other dictionaries. Each interpreter for these highly contextualized classes has to review the content vocabulary and hold an office hour with the student each week to review vocabulary. This is paid time and is invaluable to their language output. In addition, it reinforces the English vocabulary  that is what will appear on the exam 

Can you provide more detailed information about how you developed the dictionaries?

Sure, we used our local deaf resources from NSA, NASA, and Gallaudet for any established signs. We also worked with one of our interpreters who is a certified deaf interpreter (CDI) to work with our deaf students and interpreters to come up with a sign that we couldn't find that would be linguistically correct and conceptually accurate. I will be adding this dictionary to our resources.     

Great project.  This is one of the few ASL dictionaries I know of that uses signing avatars.  Most use human signers.  Why were avatars chosen instead of human signers?  Is there any evidence that the avatars are more effective for learning signs than human signers?

Thanks

I guess this isn't helpful to the discussion. This project in genius and so necessary for a fully inclusive higher education program. I'm so glad you got funding to do this work. 

This is a fantastic project! It was a pleasure to learn about your work and as many others have already noted in this discussion, I am eager to know what additional contributions your team will continue to make in the future. 

And now for my question: I appreciate the discussion above about the opportunities and challenges of expanding this work to other disciplines. I am also curious about the implications of developing something like this to support interpretation of informal science learning experiences-- particularly table-top science demonstrations like those found on museum explainer carts or at science festivals? 

Sasha: We learned from development of our series of signing dictionaries for use in grades K-12 that they are also useful for creating access to STEM content in informal settings. This resulted in a series of six signing glossaries that are specific to the content encountered in each of the six informal STEM educational learning environments. It may be that signing dictionaries such as the SBD are useful in informal settings as is or require modification. We intend to examine this in detail as our work progresses.

This is fantastic! I am a chemistry graduate student and I started to take ASL classes because I noticed the necesity of interpreters in scientific conferences and even for specific courses so I find this project great. I would like to get involved so I could learn more vocabulary and use it to increase the deaf community participation in STEAM. 

Liz: We are always interested in connecting with individuals who are interested in working with us on our projects. I have added you to our database and will be in contact as our needs evolve.

Thanks for sharing your project. I have a few questions!

First, I wonder if the avatars in your dictionary feature the grammatical elements of ASL that appear on the face, as these markers are required elements for accurate expression of many signs. If not, is that in the works? Would you consider implementing the types of technology shown in the Signing Avatars project video (https://stemforall2020.videohall.com/presentati...), or collaborating with that team?

I'm also wondering if you consult other dictionaries or resources that share STEM signs in ASL. In the ASL Clear project, which I lead (https://aslclear.org/app/#/), we've benefitted greatly by consulting with both US-based and international resources, such as Spread the Sign https://www.spreadthesign.com/en.us/search/. So I wonder if you've found other resources beneficial as well. 

This is such an important area of work! For me it is very interesting to hear that knowing vocabulary is not enough, but that the interpreters would benefit from a deeper understanding of the science. While you are focused on supporting interpreters, one of your key findings is not that different from what we have learned about science instruction=>knowing and being able to define words is related to but not sufficient for deeply understanding science concepts. This is so interesting! I wish you continued success!

Alison: Yes, our research in formal and informal settings also shows that vocabulary is an important component, but not sufficient.

Wonderful project! I'm immediately sharing this with our interpreters. Such a valuable resource!

Mark: Thank-you for the feedback. I hope your interpreters find the information helpful.

A great resource that is very needed and freely available anywhere.  Nice work.  Thank you for outlaying the problem, your solution, its features and the types of data you collect and the research questions it answers.  Does the web portal provide you with analytics for the types of traffic? How often? From where? etc.? 

Thank you for the work completed. A needed resource for teachers that does need to be expanded. An NSF project completed in the 1980s attempted a similar expanded signing resource "Science Adapted for the Hearning Impaired" for grades 3-7; SPI-8005450. The project national field trial included Gallaudet College in Washington DC and was in use in a number of state schools at the time.

Thank you for that information and the feedback

Thank you for sharing this valuable resource! This is something that I am sure so many will benefit from, and something that will open the door for more inclusion in the STEM field.