Communication support
What's available?
Communication support can help you communicated more easily with hearing people. Ever been stuck in a meeting? Not knowing what's the dentist intends to do with that scary looking drill thing? Doctor mumbling away oblivious to the fact you can't follow?
What's available:
- Lip speakers and lipreading
- Communication Support Workers (CSW's)
- Speech To Text Reporters (STTR)
- Interpreters - BSL or SSE
Lip speakers and lip reading
What is lipreading?
Lipreading is reading the visual information of spoken words. This includes how the lips, tongue, and jaw move, as well as other facial expressions.
When someone is speaking their facial movements, gestures and body language give us clues to help us follow what they are saying. Many hard of hearing people find lipreading helps them to understand more of a conversation.
What is a lipspeaker?
You're in a meeting, you've got several different people present, each one with a different dialect or lip pattern, tiring to say the least, not to mention the neck ache trying to keep up with everyone. Cue a lipspeaker.
A lipspeaker is a hearing person who has been professionally trained to be easy to lipread.
You watch one person and they will speak for everyone, usually without using their voice.
Or you choose, some people are easier to follow then others so use the lipspeaker when you need to and look away for people you can understand.
Another bonus is that many lipspeakers will also use some sign language or the BSL alphabet, assuming you know a little yourself. Discuss it with them before hand.
What do they do?
- The lipspeaker makes sure they are clearly visible to the lipreader and silently and accurately repeats the spoken message.
- The lipspeaker reproduces the rhythm and phrasing of the words used by the speaker, supporting their meaning with gesture and facial expression.
- If requested, the lipspeaker will fingerspell the initial letters of words that are difficult to lipread.
- Some lipspeakers have sign language skills and can offer lipspeaking with sign support if requested by the lipreader at the time of booking.
- A lipspeaker may be asked to use their voice, using clear communication techniques, thus enabling the lipreader to benefit from any residual hearing.
- If necessary, lipspeakers can relay a deaf person's voice.
- Lipspeakers can be booked for workplace, legal, medical and other settings.
- Currently there are two levels of qualification; the level of lipspeaker you will require depends on the nature, speed and complexity of the language used.
- For assignments that are more than two hours long, it is suggested that two lipspeakers would be required.
This list was kindly provided by the Association of Lipspeakers
When to use them
Lipspeakers are great for 1-2-1 or small meetings, it's the simplest way of having your own personal communicator on hand to help out.
More about lipreading
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Communication Support Workers
Communication support workers (CSW's) work in colleges, universities and some schools, helping deaf students to communicate with their teachers or tutors and other students.
You can also use them at work and in various other situations.
Basically they are able to communicate using a variety of methods by interpreting between spoken English and British Sign Language (BSL), lipspeaking and notetaking.
At college they can:
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working alongside other professionals, such as teachers and BSL interpreters
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helping students understand and produce written material in class
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adapting learning materials so that students understand them more easily
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suggesting ways that the school or college environment can be improved to make it easier for students to use hearing aids or lipread.
More information is available from:
Council for the Advancement of Communication with Deaf People
Learn Direct
http://www.learndirect-advice.co.uk/
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Speech To Text Reporters
Speech to Text Reporting is a process of Verbatim Computer-Aided Transcription for deaf people. It is NOT voice recognition or predictive text.
A trained Reporter takes down the verbatim spoken word on a Palantype or Stenograph keyboard. The specially trained Reporter types what she / he hears onto the Palantype / Stenograph keyboard. This is not typing every letter but words, phrases and shortcuts (thus enabling it to be verbatim.)
The computer programme then translates into English, which then appears on the laptop screen / projector screen. There is not an Oxford English Dictionary in the computer, therefore, when words are new to the computer, it translates the typed text into what it thinks is being typed and this then appears phonetically. A trained Reporter can write in excess of 200 wpm.
The job is to simultaneously translate the spoken word into English and ensure that it is displayed for a deaf, deafened, or hard of hearing, reader to view. This enables the deaf, deafened, hard of hearing person to follow proceedings on an equal footing with their colleagues.
STTRs cover exactly the same kinds of events as sign language interpreters and lip speakers, i.e. conferences, interviews, one to one sessions etc.
STTR Direct
STTRs Direct, is a private company, owned, run and managed by experienced Speech to Text Reporters who have worked at all levels of assignments.
Their experience includes working for the House of Lords, various Government Departments, organisations for deaf, deafened and hard of hearing people and charities.
They also carry out 1-2-1 support in employment and educational situations .Their collaborative experience spans over 40 years.
Association of Verbatim Speech to Text Reporters
This is the professional membership association of speech to text reporters. You can find out more about STTRs, what speech-to-text reporting is and how to become a STTR.
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Interpreters
BSL Interpreters
Many Deaf people use British Sign Language (BSL) as their first language and need to use interpreters who speak both English and BSL in meetings and at conferences.
The interpreter communicates with the deaf person in BSL and then translates the conversation or speech into spoken English for the hearing person and vice versa in a conversation.
SSE Interpreters
If you understand the signs make make up BSL but are unable or not comfortable with signing in BSL then it's possible to use a form of sign language called Sign Support English (SSE).
This means that the structure of the sentence is the same as in spoken English. Where as in BSL the structure of sentences do not follow the English language structure.
Example
English: A boy was going to the shops to buy some sweets.
BSL: Boy went shop buy sweet
Find out more about sign language here:
http://www.signedlanguage.co.uk
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