Languages- Auslan

Communicating with the Specialist Team

We look forward to partnering with you in 2023, and welcome your input:

Amanda Oakley (Languages- Auslan) Amanda.Oakley2@education.vic.gov.au

Foundation

These past couple of weeks, the Foundation students have been learning the signs to express their emotions. An important aspect to Auslan are the NMFs (Non Manual Features) and these include the facial expression, body gesture and posture. We discussed the similarities between hearing the tone of voice when you are happy, sad or cranky and when you sign these emotions, that you also convey meaning through your face and body. The children are beginning to understand that their facial expression must match their sign.  We have been practising this through Charades and Simon Says games.

Year One

In addition to the topic of emotions, Year One students have been practising putting short phrases together using colour, number and animal signs. Many are also relying less on voice and responding to questions that I am asking using Auslan only.  We have enjoyed the story of The Very Cranky Bear with Auslan narration and the children have  begun to recognise signs in the videos that we watch each lesson. See the link below.

With the change of weather getting quite chilly and wet it is the perfect time to introduce the signs for the names of the seasons and temperature signs such as hot, warm, cold, sun, wind, rain, snow, lightning and thunder. 

Auslan Student Agency

Thank you to Riley,  Justyna, Eden, Cooper, Archie and Sam from 5/6, and Sage, Frankie, Myles, Lydia, Flynn and Harper from Foundation and Year one for working together and sharing your knowledge.

As the Foundation and Year One students have been learning the signs for colour and number this term, we played a variety of games to practise these signs and share them with the Year 5/6s.

These games included coloured counters, dice, snakes, frogs and bugs.

 Auslan Electives

We were very lucky to have Megan Taylor, a Year 5/6 parent , come to visit one of our Friday sessions and speak to the students about her role as an Auslan Interpreter. Having seen so many interpreters on the the TV during the Covid information sessions, the students were interested in the types of jobs she had assisted with, and of course, if she had been on TV! 

During the last session we spoke about similarities and differences between children who are Deaf and those that are hearing. We discussed that although all children learn at school in slightly different ways, children are essentially the same and want to play, run, communicate with friends and teachers, participate in learning and have a sense of belonging. Communication; verbal, signed or through a communication board or device, is therefore key to all of these activities and life experiences. 

During our last few weeks of Term 2, the students will continue to revise all signs through games using memory cards, bingo and dominos. We will focus on weather and games related to temperature such as 'Warm Hot Cold' with a hidden treasure and our final topic this term will be farm animals.