(These journal entries are in the voice of a client who is deaf and learning to read and signed this to her interpreter, who then wrote it)

October 2, 2002

Today was harder than yesterday. In class we worked on “passive” sentences. I don’t really understand it. It’s so much easier for me to just sign in ASL. English grammar is really complex, but so is ASL. They are very complex and are very different. It is exhausting because it took a long time for me to finally learn all of the rules for ASL’s grammar and now I have to start all over again in a language I don’t speak and can’t hear, which would make things much easier.
Some of the things are the same about ASL and English. You have to add an “s” when you want to mean “more than one” thing and in ASL you have to add another sign for the same reason (Nakamara, 1995). That makes it easier, but the way you order it makes it really hard.
The hardest thing for me is learning to spell words correctly. I know I don’t have to be perfect but it makes me nervous that, when I go out to get a job, I need to know how to spell and read or else they might think I’m dumb and won’t give me the job.
Maybe tomorrow will be better…..I will write more again, then.

October 3, 2002

Unfortunately, I guessed wrong in thinking today would be better than yesterday. It was a lot harder. I get so tired sometimes of spelling and going so slow. We have to practice so much on the spelling that it makes my eyes hurt and after a while, all of the letters start looking the same and I can’t remember the difference between the two of them.
My teacher is patient with me and makes me look at her lips a lot when she is spelling and when I am reading. Sometimes it doesn’t seem fair that other kids can read really easily and I have to struggle through it. Sometimes I don’t want to read because I don’t think it is fair that I have to learn the language of hearing people. Why should I? I already know how to communicate. We as Americans don’t learn the language of countries we visit, so why should I learn the language that other people use when I don’t have to?
It’s thoughts like these that keep me from making progress. I know that I will have to become literate, but at times it makes me very frustrated because it’s so hard.

(Adapted from Orton, n.d.)

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