Genius Hour Research


Welcome Back!!

This week my goal was to do some research to gain some background knowledge on what exactly sign language is, as well as find some great resources and tools that would help me in learning sign language. 


After doing some research and looking through and reviewing many websites and apps, I finally found some resources that will best help me to learn sign language. 

But first I'll start with what I learned and what strategy is best suited for me.


Sign Language



Sign language, is a natural language that has the same linguistic properties like any spoken language. I will specifically be learning American Sign Language (ASL) as it is more commonly used in North America, and since Canada is located in North America this would be more beneficial to me :) ASL is a completely separate language from English, it has it's own pronunciations, word orders and word formations. ASL is expressed by both the movements of the hands and the face. This was very interesting to me as I was not aware that the facial expressions are also an important part of sign language, I always thought it was just about the hands. 

There is no universal sign language currently out there, different sign languages that exist are used in different countries or regions. The origins of ASL are a mystery, as well as the individual or committee who invented it. It is suggested that ASL came to be from the mixing of both local sign language and the French sign language. 


Strategies

I had a lot of difficulty actually finding strategies on learning ASL. All the websites that I went through would give me great resources, but they would not explicitly tell me how to actually learn sign language. The resources are great, but to use them I felt like I would at least need to know where to start. Then I came across a youtuber named Laura and the advice that she gave was to just... start. She recommended to start with first learning grammar, sentence structures and common phrases (ex. how are you?) and working your way from there. I found this to be great advice!

My strategy is going to be to follow the Start ASL online course, and complete the worksheets and quizzes on there. I am also going to be following Bill Vicars - Learn sign language lessons, starting from lesson 1 and working my way to lesson 15. I find his videos to be very helpful, as he repeats a lot of the gestures he teaches. I will also be learning the alphabet, but I will save this for week 5. I feel like if I am comfortable with some of the gestures and I can start incorporating them into my conversations, this can make me more confident when it comes to learning the alphabet. 


Future problems?

One of the main problems that I can see myself having is trying to memorize all the hand gestures. Another area of concern for me will be that some gestures can look very similar to one another, and this can definitely confuse me. Since I learn well with repetition I am hoping that by testing myself with repeating the gestures and quizzes, I can learn the gestures and start to differentiate between them. I also plan to start incorporating gestures that I have learned into my everyday conversations, so I can better memorize them. 


The resources that I will be using to help me on my journey to learning sign language are mainly going to be YouTube channels, websites and apps. 

The YouTube Channels

Bill Vicars: This channel is dedicated to helping people learn how to sign language. I will specifically be using his channel to go through his lessons on learning to sign language, which he has conveniently put in a playlist. 

Laura Berg Life: I will be using this channel more for learning the alphabet. She has an amazing video, where they show how to sign each letter slowly and in detail. 

The Websites

ASL Pro: This is definitely where you should apply the saying don't judge a book by it's cover. The website looks old and outdated, but it has a lot of great tools. I personally liked the ASL for babies, I think it's great for beginners to learn gestures and not feel overwhelmed. 

Start ASL: This is going to be a very helpful resource, they include free online ASL lessons, e-books, and workbooks.

Sign ASL: This is an online ASL dictionary where I can search any word and see the correct way to sign through a video.

The Apps

I specifically have three apps that I downloaded, The ASL app, Marlee Signs and Sign School. All three have videos on the basics, like the alphabet and numbers and they include dictionaries which will be very helpful (especially if I get curious how to sign a specific word). Sign School even has a sign of the day which I subscribed to, I am going to try me best and learn a new sign word each day!

From here onwards I will start my journey to learning ASL, and hopefully using my strategy I will be effective in learning the gestures and alphabets. 

I will keep you guys updated on my progress! :)


Next blog: Learning Sign Language

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