Thread by @katerowley0

Thread: The dark side of being deaf is not being unable to hear. The dark side of being deaf is being deprived of language. The dark side of being deaf is being unable to develop cognitive and psychosocial skills because of language deprivation.

The dark side of being deaf is the higher rates of poor mental health in comparison to hearing people. The dark side of being deaf is the higher rates of abuse because people take advantage of deaf children being unable to communicate.

The dark side of being deaf is being less able to develop an healthy identity and a positive outlook on life. The dark side of being deaf is not being listened to by non-deaf people, how hearing people can talk on behalf of deaf people yet deaf people are rarely able to do so.

The dark side of being deaf is having poor literacy skills (most deaf school leavers have a reading age equivalent to a 9-year-old hearing child) and being 30% less likely to achieve national benchmarks for GCSEs

The darkest side of being deaf is that the above is due to language deprivation, which is preventable. Deaf kids who are raised using both sign & spoken language (bimodal-bilinguals), do better academically, socially & develop healthy identities with a positive outlook on life.

Some resources to learn sign language (feel free to share more):

signworldlearn.com
bslcourses.co.uk
familysignlanguage.org.uk (need adobe flash player to view full site)