Irish Sign Language STEM Glossary Project - National Expansion
Year Awarded
2020
Amount
€131,277
- Organisation:Dublin City University (DCU)
- Audience:Primary Students, Transition Year Students, Primary Teachers, Post Primary Teachers - Junior Cycle, Post Primary Teachers - Senior Cycle, Parents, Third Level
- Format:Broadcast/Film
- Location:national
Project Summary
There are approximately 5,000 people in Ireland who use Irish Sign Language (ISL) as their first language (Central Statistics Office, 2017). For those Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) people to be fully engaged and scientifically informed, there must first be an agreed lexicon in Irish Sign Language for STEM terms. At present, this does not exist in Ireland. The absence of agreed signs for STEM vocabulary inhibits the teaching of STEM subjects at all levels of education and presents difficulties for those working in interpreting. It also limits access to mainstream science engagement events such as Science Week. 250,000 people engaged with Science Week in 2016 (Annual Report 2016) – Deaf people must be included in those conversations.
This project, aiming to promote and support STEM education for DHH learners, is building on projects funded for the last three years to remedy this problem. Over the last three years, we have taken one subject per year (maths, environmental science and biology respectively) and produced a glossary of up to 200 words each year. We have also had the opportunity to network with science communicators and relevant stakeholders. We would now like to expand the glossary considerably by tackling multiple subject areas simultaneously (adding 500 new terms) and having our resources available on an existing smartphone app, consolidating partnerships by supporting science communication events external to the project in making them inclusive to DHH people, and delivering a series of dedicated events for our key target groups.