Emergent Approaches towards Sign Bilingualism in Deaf Education in Kenya

Abstract

Abstract Deaf education in Kenya has faced a downward trend in recent decades. Findings over the years (KSDC47 1979, Ndurumo 1993 Okombo 1994, Adoyo 1995 show that the deaf have consistently trailed behind their hearing counterparts in academic performances. All inquiries have pointed to teachers’ lack of competence in the language of instruction as the major obstacle to their academic development. This paper discusses language accessibility for deaf children to enhance sign bilingualism and curriculum content understanding in the Kenyan deaf classroom. It highlights the changes in the teaching methodologies that have taken place without much success. The paper then argues in favour of the changes that recognise deaf children’s use of natural language - Kenyan Sign language (KSL) within the sign bilingualism framework as the language of instruction. And lastly, the paper proposes high KSL competence for the deaf educator and suggests some steps toward sign bilingualism implementation in the way forward.