Increasing Undergraduate Student Interpreters' Fluency and Accuracy in Interpreting STEM Content

Screenshot of the Signing Bioscience Dictionary
Screenshot from the Fingerspelling Tutorial Partof a man fingerspelling.
Screenshot from the Fingerspelling Tutorial Part 2 of a woman fingerspelling.

With this project TERC, Lamar University and Eastern Kentucky University (EKU) are researching and developing a unique set of teaching and learning materials that will provide students in Lamar's and EKU's interpreting programs with knowledge and skills to support students who are deaf or hard of hearing in successful learning of biology content. The project builds on outcomes of two completed projects: NSF Award #1703343 and NSF Award #2019843. During this 36-month project, the partners will:

  1. Create a Fingerspelling Bioscience Dictionary (FBD).
  2. Finalize the Video Tutorials for use at Lamar and EKU.
  3. Implement the dictionaries and tutorials with Lamar and EKU interpreting students. Study their use and effectiveness in increasing students' ASL bioscience vocabulary, fingerspelling skills, and ability to interpret undergraduate bioscience lecture material accurately and fluently.
  4. Identify aspects of the methodology that require modification.
  5. Disseminate project deliverables.

This work is being funded in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation (Award #2313816).