Usability Views Article Details  home | timeline | recent | popular | e-reports | userati | books | about  Opening up new channels of communication (20 Mar 2004) For most kids at Elmfield School in Bristol, English is their second language even though most of them were born in the UK. Their first language is British Sign Language, and this is the language that they are taught in. Now ICT is opening up new avenues of communication for many deaf children. Cath Scott, ICT coordinator at Elmfield School for Deaf Children in Bristol, says: "Using e-mail and computer-generated text gives children another choice in how they communicate. It is non-confrontational, non-judgemental and easy to edit." Cath says that the biggest barrier in using ICT effectively with deaf children is the assumption that English is their first language. "Deaf children can learn skills as quickly as hearing children but their capabilities are measured against understanding the written word," she says. Article URL: http://www.nestafuturelab.org/viewpoint/art16.htm Read 76 more articles from NESTA Futurelab sorted by date, popularity, or title. Next Article: The Death of the Art of Writing: Myth or Reality?     This site is a labour of love built by Chris McEvoy