The article I found, compared deaf and hard of hearing students in mainstream classes (or classes with hearing students) and separate classes (classes with only deaf and hard of hearing students). The article found pros for both scenarios. In the end, in both environments, the students were motivated by assessment and fear of failure, as well as good teaching and genuine acquisition of skills. Students in the mainstream courses felt positively about developing and utilizing analytic skills (rather than rote memorization) and feeling that their instructors’ took personal interest in them and their success, including flexibility in methods of assessment. However, classes from separate classes felt more positively about workload expectations, instructor feedback and communication, and the amount of choices offered in coursework.
The article begins by affirming that deaf and hard of hearing (or DHH) students are attending mainstream hearing institutions more and more. The literature review was very informational to me as well. It discussed how the previous studies included all kinds of deaf and hard of hearing, including those that were dependent on spoken English, dependent on ASL, and those that code switched between the two. They found that in academic settings DHH students tended to absorb less content information than their hearing peers and that instruction in ASL and text does not necessarily create significantly better outcomes (but if there are positives differences, it is through text, not ASL), which is not really what my Chronicle article indicated (haha). It also indicated that teachers who were skilled or experienced with teaching DHH students were better at motivating DHH students to utilize their resources and strengths. DHH students that attend mainstream institutions also tend to retain more residual hearing (which is really interesting and definitely applicable to Lindsay’s experience). Previous studies also emphasized the importance of having an interpreter and the frustration felt trying to communicate with the instructor. How DHH students interpret their communication ability in the classroom seemed to predict grades at the end of the semester as well. DHH students are also more likely make deep connections with their education than their hearing students.
This study explained some of their findings, such as why DHH students in mainstream classes are more sensitive to pace of teaching because they are often dependent on indirect methods (interpreters or text-captioning) and reluctant to ask questions in class because of the communication barrier. The study also found that instructors of mainstream classes preferred instructor centered “information-transmission” teaching styles, while those in separate classes focused on “conceptual change”. This may be part of why those in separate classes appeared to learn more, but the relationship between instruction style and success needs more studying.
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