Welcoming Deaf Kids and Families to Your Library: Resources

ASL Vocabulary:

ASL Manual Alphabet (printable .pdf)

ASL.ms: Fingerspelling practice tool.

ASL Speed Spell: This app, which is available for both Android and Apple devices, will help you practice your receptive fingerspelling.

Getting to Know You Signs Handout (printable .pdf)

Manners Signs Handout (printable .pdf)

Manners Signs 0:55 (video)

Library Signs: Kids and Families handout (printable .pdf)

Numbers 0-10 Signs Handout (printable .pdf)

Numbers 1 through 10 in ASL (Lifeprint) 7:22 (video)

Recommended Online ASL Dictionaries:

Library Signs Resources from Kathy MacMillan: A collection of “bite-sized” videos and printable handouts suitable for sharing in staff meetings or for individual learning, all featuring basic ASL vocabulary useful for library staff.

How to sign “Welcome to the Library” in ASL:

 

Communication Resources:

Communication Tips from Deaf Cultural Resource Center (Library for Deaf Action)

Guidelines for Effective Communication with Deaf, Late-Deafened, and Hard of Hearing People (Massachusetts Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing)

Live Transcription on your smartphone:

Boogie Boards: These simple writing tablets allow you to write with anything and clear the screen with a button press.

Special Needs Communication Guide: A handy printable resource you can keep at service desks to assist in communicating with patrons who are Deaf or hard-of-hearing, speak Spanish, or have limited communication skills. This 21-page communication guide was put together by The Library of Fanwood and Scotch Plains (New Jersey, USA), and contains English, Spanish, and fingerspelled words, as well as pictures for common concepts and items in the library setting.

Recommended clear masks:

 

Deaf Culture Resources:

Deaf Culture PEPNet Tipsheet by Professor Linda Siple, Assistant Professor Leslie Greer, and Associate Professor Barbra Ray Holcomb, all of the Department of American Sign Language and Interpreting Education, National Technical Institute for the Deaf, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY.

Maryland Deaf Culture Digital Library: https://www.marylanddcdl.org

Audism Unveiled (DVD). (DawnSignPress, 2008)

 

Accommodations and Advocacy:

ADA Requirements: Effective Communication: https://www.ada.gov/effective-comm.pdf

A Note From Your Colleagues With Hearing Loss: Just Use a Microphone Already by Jessie B. Ramey

Hear This!: Use That Microphone, Already by Kathy MacMillan: Includes recommendations of cost-effective amplification options for schools, camps, and libraries.

Resources for Finding and Working with Interpreters

On-Demand Video Interpreting:

Sample Accommodations Pages:

Sample wording for brief statement to be included on program pages:
To request accommodations for this program, contact [specific person] at [specific email address that is checked often] at least 7 days before the program.

Advocacy Letter for Museums and Libraries from the National Association of the Deaf: This document lays out the legal requirements for accommodations in libraries and museums in great detail.  Share with your administration!

Disability Rights Watch with author Sara Nović

Change, Not Charity (American Experience): A fantastic 53-minute documentary about the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

 

Recommended Books:

Show Me a Sign by Ann Clare LeZotte. Scholastic, 2020;  Set Me Free by Ann Clare LeZotte. Scholastic, 2021; Sail Me Away Home by Ann Clare LeZotte. Scholastic, 2023:  Set in the early 1800s, these engrossing historical novels – written by a Deaf author – explores prejudice and racism through the eyes of 11-year-old Mary Lambert, who is deaf. For discussion questions and classroom/programming activities related to the books, see “Reading Guide: The Show Me a Sign Trilogy by Ann Clare LeZotte” by Kathy MacMillan. Scholastic, 2023.

Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language: Hereditary Deafness on Martha’s Vineyard by Nora Ellen Groce. Harvard University Press, 1985: The remarkable story of Martha’s Vineyard, which once boasted a deaf population so large that deaf people were completely integrated into the life of the island and everyone used sign language.

True Biz by Sara Nović. Random House, 2022: This extraordinary novel tells the story of the CODA (hearing child of Deaf adults) headmistress and two Deaf students at a school for the deaf. Nović intertwines their stories, skillfully interjecting background information for readers about ASL, Deaf culture, and linguistics.

 

More resources from Stories By Hand: