Last Thursday

I would like to clear up something said Last Thursday. When I mentioned that my Hearing DHH teacher taught and pushed me to read, and that the Deaf mentor taught me to enjoy the stories in ASL. I in no way was trying to say that Deaf teachers can't teach students to read fluently. I didn't have a deaf teacher, I wasn't a residential school student, I went to KSD for their activities and summer camp program, there were adults there that were teachers during the year, but they weren't teaching more than reviewing what we already knew and providing us engaging activities during the summer. This is why I mention deaf adults as Mentors not Teachers, because I didn't get that experience. I think that deaf teachers and hearing teachers can teach the content equally. My point that I was making, is that I prefer to learn form a mix and diverse set of people. My comment was this: I learned to improve my reading and learned to love reading to my self (quietly) because of one teacher (who happened to be a hearing DHH teacher), while I learned to love the visuals of ASL storytelling from deaf mentors.
I use BOTH in my life, this is one reason I love being bilingual. I can read a text by myself without help and comprehend it all on my own, or I can enjoy a book for fun; however, if i want to see it visually I also, have that opportunity. Or if I am struggling to comprehend something in a text I can sign it to myself to see if it makes better sense to me when I try translating it in sign language (my version of hearing people's reading out loud, similar to an ESL person reading a text in their first language instead of in English, if they struggle).

Also, on the topic of education settings, as I said I was mainstreamed my whole life. In elementary school I had resource room time I think the amount of time varied each day, honestly hard to remember, because a child's time tracking isn't always the greatest. In elementary and middle school I also, had speech therapy that I was pulled out of class for. In 4th-highschool grade level, I was only pulled out of class to resource room if I struggled with a lesson, or there was some work on expanded curriculum, or deaf interactive activities going on (the deaf students got to take deaf only field trips). I had a the same DHH teacher from K-3rd grade, then a different one for 4th and 5th, but I knew this teacher because she worked with the the other group of D/deaf students while mine worked with my group, and sometimes they would flip classes or teach or do activities together. I had couple different DHH teacher in middle school, and a few High School. I was close and connected to all my DHH teachers except for high school, there's a reason for that, I won't go into unless asked. I was also, close to my interpreters, but no they did not follow me around all day. Did I have any interpreters I wasn't close to? yes, there were some interpreters that I personally struggled with, and to me they weren't good interpreters, maybe they were good for someone else, but they didn't match me. It happens.

If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask!