This week I have decided to write about Handspeak, the ASL dictionary. Handspeak is a website that provides an online ASL dictionary with videos and definitions of words in American Sign Language. As I have been working on this inquiry project I have used a few different ASL dictionary resources, but I think this one has been the most helpful to me! Below, I have outlined my favourite features of the Handspeak website.
Sign of the Day
Every day, Handspeak posts a video of a new sign. The videos don’t have a definition with them so you can try and guess the word they are signing. After you try to figure out what word they are signing you can hit the ‘take me to the word in the dictionary’ link to see what the word was. This feature could be a great addition to a morning routine in the classroom. Trying to figure out what the new sign is every day would get students thinking right away and help them learn new signs over the course of the year!
Language/Cultural Fundamentals
The Handspeak website has a section called ‘Language/Cultural Fundamentals’ that has links to lots of different resources. The pages I found most useful in this section were ‘What is American Sign Language?‘, ‘Deaf Culture and Sign Language’, and ‘Audism: a form of discrimiation’. These pages were very helpful to learn about deaf culture and the history of American Sign Language. A lot of the information provided on them could be useful when teaching students about deaf culture.
Basic Stories and Poems
This section of the Handspeak website provides a description of a story or poem and a video of someone signing the story. When watching these stories, I try to pick up on words I already know or patterns of language. Each story/poem page also offers points of the story and grammar sections.
So far I have found resources to teach the ASL alphabet and numbers to students as well as projects they can do to learn more about ASL. I am excited to continue exploring ASL and ways to teach it to students! If you are looking to learn more as well, come back next week! Thanks for reading 🙂
rachelroses
Hi Hailey, thank you for telling me about this awesome resource! I think that kids would really enjoy the sign of day, it actually kind of reminds me of Wordle! It would be a great morning activity to engage everyone and get their brains working!
jessicaliebe
Hello Hailey! You have once again provided an amazing resource for teaching ASL, thanks! I really like the Sign of the Day feature, and I agree that it would be great to add into a classroom morning routine. Thanks for sharing!