The current craze is for young children to learn sign language skills when they are able to better reap the benefits. Sign Language is the third most spoken language in the United States. Although, the speaking of the language is not universal, learning a bit of sign language can be beneficial to adults and not just children.

“According to estimates given by the World Health Organization 278 million people worldwide have moderate to profound hearing loss in both ears (who.int). Although a majority of deaf and hearing impaired people live in low and middle income countries (who.int). Deafness of hard of hearing can be caused by genetics, birth defects or even illness.

For someone with mild hearing loss speech must be loud to be understood. This person will likely have deficiencies in language usage and comprehension. Their vocabulary will be limited. For a person with moderate hearing loss, the speaker will need to be about one foot from ear and be very loud. This person may be able to discriminate vowels, but not all consonants. Speech and language will be affected and will not develop spontaneously if hearing loss is present before 12 months of age unless amplification is provided.

A person with profound hearing loss my be able to hear loud sounds but may be more aware of vibrations. Their speech language will be defective. Speech and language will be affected and will not develop spontaneously if hearing loss is present before 12 months of age unless amplification is provided.

With these facts it may be important for emergency personnel, doctors, teachers, and others to recognize a few basic signs to know what people are communicating to them. Learning the basic alphabet takes only a little bit of time to learn. Most colleges offer a basic sign language course as part of its curriculum. For those interested there are available classes to take as part of becoming an interpreter.

The number of people with hearing impairment is growing with longer life expectancies and a growing global population (who.int).. They are apart of our mainstream community. They should no longer be stereotyped as being dumb or stupid. You may desire to teach your kids sign language for increased educational skills, but learning sign language as an adult can have benefits too.