Interpreted education: A study of deaf students' access to the content and form of literacy instruction in a mainstreamed high school English class

Since the passage of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975, which guarantees all children access to public education, most deaf children are enrolled in local public school programs. The majority of these children require a sign language interpreter so that they can tap into the flow of auditory communication around them. The fact that deaf children in hearing classrooms depend on a third party to interpret all social and academic information in classrooms raises complex educational and linguistic issues. Few studies have examined the ways in which, and the extent to which, the interpretation captures, through language, a teacher's instructional goals. This study consists of qualitative and sociolinguistic analyses of the context and linguistic form of one teacher's spoken, literacy-related instructional discourse, and an interpreter's rendition of that discourse.;This study incorporates three central suppositions grounded in education and sociolinguistic theory. First, literacy-related instructional messages occur in social contexts. Second, instructional messages are embedded in the organization of classroom talk. And third, deaf students' access to content and advanced forms of literacy learning can be understood by an analysis of the relationship between the organization of spoken English discourse and the organization of its signed interpretation.;Results of this study indicate a strong pattern of lexical and grammatical deletions in the interpreted rendition across discourse structures. Discourse analyses revealed that the linguistic or instructional integrity of the spoken message was rarely retained in the interpretation. Moreover, linguistic evidence, particularly with respect to consistent deletions of pronouns and key cohesive elements, precluded deaf students' participation in classroom discussions, participation that is considered integral to advanced forms of literacy learning.;This study suggests that educational interpreter-training programs need to include specific instruction on the nature and goals of instructional classroom discourse. In addition, in order to design a classroom program based on both auditory and visual cues for academic learning, it is essential that teachers be informed about the ways deaf students access classroom interaction. As a result, both deaf and hearing students would have access to, as well as the opportunity to participate in, and benefit from, academic discourse.