At Achieve together we support hearing to be more inclusive to the d/Deaf world. In light of this, we have worked with our d/Deaf specialist homes to create some powerful content that can help us all to support hearing to be more inclusive to the d/Deaf world, and improve communication for D/deaf people.

Firstly we would like to raise awareness of terminology and language within this community. To ensure inclusivity for all within this community our Specialist Home Manager Boo wanted to share the following: “It is important that we include all people when addressing the deaf community, and there is a distinct difference between those who are profoundly deaf, born deaf, or culturally deaf, opposed to those who deafened, hard of hearing, or have acquired deafness. A way we can ensure we are being inclusive when speaking about this community is to address individuals as the following d/Deaf. The big ‘D’ represents those who are profoundly, born, or culturally deaf, and the small ‘d’ represents those who are deafened, hard of hearing, or have acquired deafness.”

Secondly, we would like to raise awareness of the landmark breakthrough for the d/Deaf community last week as the BSL Act was passed, which officially recognises BSL as a language. This is a momentous occasion for the d/Deaf community and will mean that the d/Deafcommunity has the right to access services such as health and education using their language, BSL.

The BSL Act will clarify the adjustments required for d/Deaf people using BSL and hopefully aid in better quality access provision to sign language interpreters, as well as increasing the pool of interpreters available, over time. This will alleviate the stress and anxiety caused by poor access, such as forcing d/Deaf people to lip read or write in English when visiting the GP.

Team members from a variety of Achieve together homes attended the BSL rally in March to support the BSL Act being passed.

Boo the Home Manager for Robins Way, one of our d/Deaf specialist homes spoke to Lise a person she supports about how she felt about the BSL Act being passed. You can watch this touching video here.

Malhinder a team member from our Olive Lane home created this powerful video explaining her 5 top tips for communicating with D/deaf people. You can watch the video here.

Finally, we would like to share some videos created by people we support and team members from Wilbury Gardens and EDS Bath homes. They created videos demonstrating some keywords and phrases in BSL we could all learn to help communicate effectively with the D/deaf community.

Watch the BSL Communication video here.

Watch the BSL Alphabet video here.

Watch the BSL Family video here.

Watch the BSL Getting Out and About video here.

Thank you and well done to all those involved in the production of these videos.

 

Interested in our D/deaf specialist homes and support?

If you’d like to know more about what D/deaf homes and support we can offer you in your local area, just let us know by contacting us at our referrals hub.