suzmccarth wrote:

>
> --- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Peter T. Daniels"
> <grammatim@...> wrote:
> > suzmccarth wrote:
>
> > > In contrast, one of my special students this year who is severely
> > > hearing impaired, but has hearing aids which are supposed to
> > > approximate normal hearing, can only read at a grade two level, at
> > > 11 years of age. She has a high IQ but is just learnig now the
> > > phonological, syntactic and semantic skills which are prerequisite
> > > to reading.
>
> > > Her chances of catching up in a hearing world are considered quite
> > > good now so she hasn't learned sign. She may learn it as a social
> > > skill later.
> >
> > That's child abuse. Is there no Deaf community in Vancouver?
>
> Maybe you are unaware that the *average* deaf or hard of
> hearing child finishes high school, at age 17 or 18, with a grade
> 3 or 4 reading level. This child is going to do much better than
> that.
>
> Being able to process a writing system and use it to create
> meaning is entirely dependent on the ability to process the
> language which the writing system represents.

Sorry, but being deprived of a natural language is child abuse.

Why do you suppose "dummy" is a term of (linguistic) abuse?
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...