This doesn't need much explanation. These are the jobs being advertised today on the British Association of Teachers of the Deaf website. Only one demands more than Level 2 BSL (roughly equal to a GCSE) and many of the Teacher of the Deaf posts don't even require a qualification as a Teacher of the Deaf.
*Note the references to good oral/written skills and fluency in English!
Teacher of the Deaf (Peripatetic Sensory Support Teacher)
East Riding of Yorkshire Council
Salary: MPS/UPS & £4116/£2016 SEN allowance (pro rata). The higher SEN allowance will be offered with CACDP/Signature Level 2. SEN £4116/£2058 depending on level of BSL qualification
MPS/UPS & £2058 SEN allowance (pro rata) for candidates without CACDP/Signature Level 2
Section 77 - 84 of the Immigration Act 2016 requires that the Council ensures that all customer facing staff are able to speak an appropriate standard of English; therefore any applicants for customer facing posts will be assessed on this basis as part of the interview process.
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Part Time Support Assistant/Technician
Roding Primary School
Roding Lane North, Woodford Bridge, Essex
_________________________________
Qualified Teacher of the Deaf 0.8FTE
Cambridgeshire County Council
Qualified teacher status is essential Qualified Teacher of the Deaf (QToD) status is desirable.
______________________________
Sign Support Assistant
Cwmbran High School
Ty Gwyn Way, Fairwater, Cwmbran
As a minimum the successful candidate must possess BSL level two.
__________________________________
Teacher of the Deaf - Peripatetic and Hearing Support Centres
Wandsworth Hearing Support Services
The Lodge, Linden Lodge School, 61 Princes Way, London
______________________________
Teacher of the Deaf
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
Children and Young Peoples Services, Education & Skills
We are looking to recruit a Teacher of the Deaf. Excellent communication skills are essential, including at least a Level 2 qualification in British Sign Language.
____________________________________
Non-Class Based Teacher of the Deaf and SEN
Tany's Dell Primary School
Mowbray Road, Harlow, Essex
You must have Qualified Teacher Status as well as BSL Level 1 as a minimum, although a BSL Level 2 qualification is desirable.
______________________________
Teacher of the Deaf
London Borough of Newham
Sensory Service, Tunmarsh Centre, Tunmarsh Lane, London Borough of Newham
They will need to have excellent oral and written communication skills and understand the barriers to learning that children and young people with a hearing impairment face and how these barriers may be overcome.
Qualified Teacher of the Deaf status will be awarded +2 SEN. Teachers wishing to undertake training will be considered (+ 1 SEN ).
_______________________________
Communication Support Worker (CSW)
Exeter Deaf Academy
Communication Support Worker (CSW) - Scale 1
Actual starting range for 35 hours per week, 38 weeks per year (term time) = £15,921.00 with the opportunity to progress to £17,364.00
Key Requirements (please refer to the person specification for full details):
British Sign Language Qualification Level 3
GCSE Mathematics & English Language Grade A-C.
Experience of supporting deaf learners in a communication context
Good oral & written communication skills
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Teacher of the Deaf 0.6 fte
Allestree Woodlands School
Blenheim Drive, Allestree, Derby
____________________________________
Teacher of the Deaf
Sheffield Service for Deaf and Hearing Impaired Children
Qualified Teachers with a proven interest in Deaf education and a willingness to undertake the mandatory qualification may be considered. Service staff are expected to have, or work towards, British Sign Language Level 2.
___________________________________
Teacher of the Deaf
Foreland Fields School
Newlands Lane, Ramsgate, Kent,
BSL Level 2, qualification or above.
_________________________________
FTE Advisory Teacher for Deaf Children & Young People
Camden Council
Job title: Advisory Teacher for Deaf Children & Young People, 0 - 25 years Qualified Teacher Status and Additional Qualified Teacher of the Deaf Status
You will have BSL stage 2 or be willing to undertake training.
_______________________________
Team Leader - Secondary ARC for Deaf Children
Bradford Council
Based at Hanson Academy
Department of Children’s Services
Sensory Service
Do you want to make a difference to the lives of Deaf children?
Team Leader - Secondary ARC for Deaf Children
MPS / UPS + 2 SEN (£4,034) + TLR 1 (£7,621)
The Code of Practice on the English language requirement for public sector workers, Part 7 of the Immigration Act 2016 requires that Councils ensure that all candidates applying for customer facing posts must be assessed in order to establish their fluency in English.
_______________________________
Teacher of the Deaf TLR post
Bradford Council
Based at Hanson Academy
MPS / UPS + 2 SEN (£4,034) + TLR 2b (£4,104)
32.5 hours per week Term time only Teachers Pay and Conditions
Established
Based at Hanson Academy
The Code of Practice on the English language requirement for public sector workers, Part 7 of the Immigration Act 2016 requires that Councils ensure that all candidates applying for customer facing posts must be assessed in order to establish their fluency in English.
_______________________________
Specialist Teacher of the Deaf – High Needs Provision (P/T)
Hamilton Lodge School & College
___________________________
2 x Communication Support Workers
Five Elms Primary School
Wood Lane, Dagenham Essex
NOR: 532, including nursery and Additional Resource Provision for deaf children
Salary Scale - 4 - £14,341 - £15,831 (actual pro rata salary)
What do we need?
Successful candidates must have an ability to sign to BSL level 2
Thursday 19 October 2017
Saturday 7 October 2017
... those interested in Deaf/Welsh education.
I'm fascinated by the support given to the introduction of a British Sign Language GCSE. Has anyone thought about what problem they are trying to solve, and whether this would achieve it?
I was born in Wales in 1969. Growing up with English speaking parents & siblings, we didn't speak Welsh or feel the need to speak Welsh. The Welsh language was in decline and in the 70s/80s, in an attempt to boost the numbers of Welsh speakers, it was made compulsory to attend Welsh language classes until we selected our O-levels.
The language continued to be in decline, so it was made compulsory to sit a Welsh language GCSE. (O-levels and CSEs became GCSEs in the mid/late 80s.)
The problem with this strategy is twofold:
1) You can lead a horse to water, but if you push it's head into a stream, it might drown! Students who struggled with Welsh, or languages in general, felt they were 'wasting' a GCSE choice and resentment grew.
2) Learning a language to pass exams, is very different from absorbing a language for everyday use, and it would be VERY rare in most parts of Wales for any child to NEED Welsh on an everyday basis. If a speaker can revert to their mother tongue, they will.
The growth of Welsh medium schools (from reception to A-level) is effective in many ways, though not without issues, some of which are based around native Welsh speakers reportedly being 'held back' by Welsh learners who don't get the practise outside of school.
Now, what has all this got to do with Deaf education? Well, there are many similarities and one HUGE difference.
For children who are Deaf, there is little or no option to revert to a 'mother tongue'. BSL isn't their language of choice, it is a necessity often denied, so the idea that BSL medium schools (or schools for the Deaf) would close down is crazy ... right? Wrong! Here in Wales, there are a grand total of ZERO schools for the Deaf. The option is:
1)Send your Deaf child to a mainstream school with some kind of 'unit' and support from some staff who can use BSL to various degrees of competency,
2)Ask your education authority's permission to send your child away to England (Exeter or Newbury typically) to be educated.
Now imagine we treated children who speak Welsh like this! Imagine if you will, that when your child is born, they can learn language, but it's Welsh, and for some reason, they can not understand or speak English. No one in your family has ever spoken Welsh.
Your 4 yr old child who was born 'profoundly Welsh' can go to a local English speaking school, and they'll have a support worker who passed their Welsh O-level in 1984 to support them.
As they progress, a 'Teacher of the Welsh' (TOW) will come in to monitor them as often as once every half term. The TOW doesn't actually speak Welsh, but has done many courses about diversification of materials and will use the support worker to interpret. *Importantly, I am not doubting the skills of such a teacher, simply the policy which doesn't require them to know both languages.
As good parents do, you look for Welsh classes. They are available, but are in the evening and cost a fortune. When you decide that one of you can do the classes, you find they are all full. Apparently, there are a lot of people out there who have 'always wanted to learn Welsh', but don't have any personal reason to do so. If one of you does manage to get onto a class, the Welsh you learn isn't the same as the Welsh that the support workers use in school - your partner is now feeling even more left out, because try as you might, you can't teach them as much as you are taught, and progress is slow!
You look on Youtube and find lots of videos of English speakers who are translating the latest pop songs into Welsh. Not so helpful.
Your child can only learn Welsh to the level they experience it (second language O-level) so, by the time they are going into Secondary school, there are all sorts of issues.
Would introducing a Welsh GCSE help this situation?
Surely, a campaign to ensure fluent Welsh speakers were supporting children at Foundation stages would help more? That's where language development happens, right? That way, your child's language would develop in the same way as their peers and by the time they come to sit their GCSEs, there would be no question of any support workers having anything except FULL fluency in both languages.
Alongside plans to help families learn the language that their child needs, and awareness raising in general, I believe this would give those children in a linguistic and cultural minority a better chance, whilst also raising the profile of the language in a professional and useful way.
I was born in Wales in 1969. Growing up with English speaking parents & siblings, we didn't speak Welsh or feel the need to speak Welsh. The Welsh language was in decline and in the 70s/80s, in an attempt to boost the numbers of Welsh speakers, it was made compulsory to attend Welsh language classes until we selected our O-levels.
The language continued to be in decline, so it was made compulsory to sit a Welsh language GCSE. (O-levels and CSEs became GCSEs in the mid/late 80s.)
The problem with this strategy is twofold:
1) You can lead a horse to water, but if you push it's head into a stream, it might drown! Students who struggled with Welsh, or languages in general, felt they were 'wasting' a GCSE choice and resentment grew.
2) Learning a language to pass exams, is very different from absorbing a language for everyday use, and it would be VERY rare in most parts of Wales for any child to NEED Welsh on an everyday basis. If a speaker can revert to their mother tongue, they will.
The growth of Welsh medium schools (from reception to A-level) is effective in many ways, though not without issues, some of which are based around native Welsh speakers reportedly being 'held back' by Welsh learners who don't get the practise outside of school.
Now, what has all this got to do with Deaf education? Well, there are many similarities and one HUGE difference.
For children who are Deaf, there is little or no option to revert to a 'mother tongue'. BSL isn't their language of choice, it is a necessity often denied, so the idea that BSL medium schools (or schools for the Deaf) would close down is crazy ... right? Wrong! Here in Wales, there are a grand total of ZERO schools for the Deaf. The option is:
1)Send your Deaf child to a mainstream school with some kind of 'unit' and support from some staff who can use BSL to various degrees of competency,
2)Ask your education authority's permission to send your child away to England (Exeter or Newbury typically) to be educated.
Now imagine we treated children who speak Welsh like this! Imagine if you will, that when your child is born, they can learn language, but it's Welsh, and for some reason, they can not understand or speak English. No one in your family has ever spoken Welsh.
Your 4 yr old child who was born 'profoundly Welsh' can go to a local English speaking school, and they'll have a support worker who passed their Welsh O-level in 1984 to support them.
As they progress, a 'Teacher of the Welsh' (TOW) will come in to monitor them as often as once every half term. The TOW doesn't actually speak Welsh, but has done many courses about diversification of materials and will use the support worker to interpret. *Importantly, I am not doubting the skills of such a teacher, simply the policy which doesn't require them to know both languages.
As good parents do, you look for Welsh classes. They are available, but are in the evening and cost a fortune. When you decide that one of you can do the classes, you find they are all full. Apparently, there are a lot of people out there who have 'always wanted to learn Welsh', but don't have any personal reason to do so. If one of you does manage to get onto a class, the Welsh you learn isn't the same as the Welsh that the support workers use in school - your partner is now feeling even more left out, because try as you might, you can't teach them as much as you are taught, and progress is slow!
You look on Youtube and find lots of videos of English speakers who are translating the latest pop songs into Welsh. Not so helpful.
Your child can only learn Welsh to the level they experience it (second language O-level) so, by the time they are going into Secondary school, there are all sorts of issues.
Would introducing a Welsh GCSE help this situation?
Surely, a campaign to ensure fluent Welsh speakers were supporting children at Foundation stages would help more? That's where language development happens, right? That way, your child's language would develop in the same way as their peers and by the time they come to sit their GCSEs, there would be no question of any support workers having anything except FULL fluency in both languages.
Alongside plans to help families learn the language that their child needs, and awareness raising in general, I believe this would give those children in a linguistic and cultural minority a better chance, whilst also raising the profile of the language in a professional and useful way.
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