Deaf Mentors

The DeafMentor Program was established in 1991. At that time in deaf education the profession was beginning to see the benefits of using American Sign Language (ASL) along with written English to create a bilingual experience for deaf or hard of hearing children who were ages 3-8.  SKI-HI was focused on how we could provide a bilingual and bicultural experience for deaf/hard of hearing children in the first three years of their lives, when language is naturally acquired. Prior to establishing the Deaf Mentor Program, families were able to access support for developing spoken language, but there was little support for them to learn and use ASL. The Deaf Mentor Program was created to help families learn ASL in their home from a Deaf adult who is a fluent ASL user. Deaf Mentors focus on teaching families to use ASL in their daily routines, share early visual communication techniques with families, and share information about Deaf culture with the family. They also invite families to local Deaf community events so the child and family have opportunities to meet deaf and hard of hearing adults that live in their community.

A Deaf Mentor provides family-centered, home based, and curriculum-led early education in the home, focusing on Visual Communication, American Sign Language, and Bridging and Navigating Deaf and Hearing Experiences with the families with deaf children, birth to age six (or beyond).

A deaf mentor...

• is Deaf (including those who view self as hard of hearing and may have acquired American Sign Language at varying points in their young lives or later)
• has ASL skills, both expressive and receptive. ASL Deaf Mentors must exhibit fluency in ASL. Hard of hearing mentors would need basic sign communication skills to interact with other Deaf team members and to support families who are also using signs with auditory-oral skills
• is well trained in early intervention principles and receives basic training and ongoing professional development
• helps families gain an understanding of what it is like to be deaf, so that they, as parents, can better facilitate some of the experiences that their child may have as they grow up
• teaches the family ASL in a manner that is structured and designed specifically for families of infants and young children, and acting as a guide and/or facilitator into the local Deaf community, including where and how the deaf people who may not use ASL live their lives
• monitors with the families the deaf child’s language development and progress according to standards (and/or stages)
• is actively involved in the Deaf community and events where the families may be involved in for mutual support and enjoyment
• is kept abreast of current trends, research and discussions pertaining to best practices
• partners with the Early Interventionists serving the child and with the child’s educational team to ensure the child reaches his/her full potential
• is someone that the child and family can look up to and learn from - a role model
• is comfortable working directly with children birth to six years of age who are comfortable working with young children and with families in the family’s home, sharing their life experiences being deaf and answering any questions that would help families feel empowered
• acts as a language model for the deaf child, interacting with the child in ways that take advantage of his/her visual environment. …provides opportunities for the families to bridge auditory and speech experiences into visual communication and ASL, and vice versa
• supports, teaches, facilitates, and models with families ways that they can more effectively communicate with their deaf child

Meet the Team

Research

Deaf Mentor is not just a thought, it's supported by Research.

The Deaf Mentor Experimental Project investigated the efficacy of deaf mentor services to young deaf children and their families. These services focused on deaf adults (mentors), who made regular home visits to the children and their families; shared their language (American Sign Language), culture, and personal knowledge of deafness with the families; and served as role models for the children. The children also received regular home visits from a parent advisor who helped the family promote the child's early listening, English, and literacy skills. The result was a bilingual-bicultural home environment for these children. The children who received deaf mentor services were compared to matched children who did not receive these services but who received parent advisor services. Children receiving this early bilingual-bicultural programming made greater language gains during treatment time, had considerably larger vocabularies, and scored higher on measures of communication, language, and English syntax than the matched children.

Read More

Resources

• Training
• Top 10 Practices
• 2016 Deaf Mentor Program Pre-Session

Contact

For more information about Deaf Mentors, please contact Paula Pittman, paula.pittman@usu.edu, or call or text her at 801-668-0948.