INTEC begins a diploma in Sign Language
SANTO DOMINGO. The Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo (INTEC) and the National Institute for Teacher Training and Education (INAFOCAM) started a Diploma in Teaching Sign Language L1 and L2, aimed at deaf coeducators who work in schools and specific classrooms for students of the same condition taught sign language.
The fundamental purpose of the program is to strengthen the pedagogical and linguistic competencies of deaf co-educators in specific schools and classrooms, linked to the process of teaching sign language to both deaf students, parents, hearing teachers or any interested in learning sign language.
“INTEC is a pioneer once again in attention to the needs of society and aware of the needs of this vulnerable minority, designed and managed through its Permanent Education direction this program that we are proud to offer, in collaboration and support of INAFOCAM, who from the beginning showed interest and offered full support,” said Carlos Reyes, director of Permanent Education at INTEC.
El diploma program is done in a hybrid format, with virtual classes completely asynchronous and face-to-face meetings once a month to practice, beef up, feed back y assess the planned competencies.
The asynchronous classes will be video recorded by the teachers in charge of the modules and posted in the virtual classroom so that participants can see them and review them as many times as necessary, taking into account their learning rhythms. Likewise, they will upload their practices in videos in sign language, which will be focused on students from their own educational centers.
There will be 5 synchronous meetings between October 2023 and March 2024.
This INTEC and INAFOCAM diploma will certify deaf co-educators as facilitators in sign language both as a first language for deaf children in schools and for hearing people (teachers from the same schools for deaf students, parents, companies, general public).
Likewise, specific schools for deaf students will benefit as students, teachers, families, administrative staff and the community to which the educational center is limited will have the opportunity to learn the target language from the hands of a native signer with the skills to do it effectively in a contextualized way.
Among the competencies that the Diploma in teaching Sign Language as L1 and L2 seeks to develop are the development of the ability to evaluate various levels of bilingualism in the communication situations that it analyzes to propose ways to increase fluency in both languages. ; evaluate and create activities for the natural acquisition of sign language and for its formal teaching; tell stories in sign language belonging to the hearing culture, create poems, ABC stories and 1 2 3 typical of the deaf culture, among many others of equal relevance.
L1 and L2 sign languages refer to two different types of sign languages used by deaf and hard of hearing people:
L1 or Primary Sign Language, which refers to the sign language that a deaf person acquires naturally from birth or a very early age, as their mother tongue and L2 or Secondary Sign Language, which refers to L2 refers to a sign language that a deaf person learns after their L1.