Hi everyone! I'm a hearing student of Deaf Connect who is currently learning Auslan. The assessment I'm working on is researching on the development of educational and social conditions for Australian Deaf communities.

To complete this research project ethically and accurately, my assessment requires sourcing perspectives directly from Deaf individuals. I have created a very brief Google Form with just three short questions about your personal perspectives or experiences regarding how educational and social conditions have evolved in Australia.

Link to the survey: https://forms.gle/Xh7FyZpH9RFaYn8d8

Anonymity: Your responses will be kept completely anonymous and will only be used for my private course assignment and with Deaf Connect trainers.

Time: It should take no more than 5 to 10 minutes to complete.

I completely respect your time and thank you so much in advance to anyone who is willing to share their insights with a hearing student.

Hello! I’m very very new to learning auslan, and started mainly because I have audhd and have been experiencing more difficulty speaking recently due to burnout/stress. I understand that facial expressions and mouth movements are very important to any sign language, which naturally includes Auslan, but how difficult would it be for someone to still understand me if my facial expressions are limited? I am not completely devoid of expressions, but I don’t think that I am that expressive with my face or body, or at least expressing things intentionally (I show expressions, I am just not great at controlling them or faking them), and I think it would probably be amplified if I were distressed. I will probably try and make my body movements a bit more expressive as I learn, and I am willing to try and control my expressions, but I am wondering if it would impact my ability to be cohesive if I were to be less expressive.
Thank you in advance for any feedback! :)

I am beginning to learn Auslan, have been just online so far for the last month, and have this sign in my head but cannot remember for the life of me what it is.

It is non-dominant hand flat handshape palm facing up, active hand is in seven handshape and slides across the palm outwards. Very similar to the sign for number, so maybe I have gotten confused but it is driving me crazy! Happy to be told I'm making it up if I am.

Thanks in advance

I have to wear a face mask for in person meetings for health reasons - was wondering if facial expressions are vital for Auslan examinations. Im hoping to study and then get accredited so I can find jobs in Auslan translating, however its such a big investment that I gotta know if there are any major roadblocks.

I really wanna learn Auslan in person. I live in QLD and would be happy with free or paid classes, but my school sadly doesn’t offer it. I know the alphabet and a few basic signs like friend, thank you, tasty eat, boy/girl, but I’m still very much a beginner. I think it’s a fantastic skill to have, and I also have a deaf friend at church who’s the same age as me. I’d love to be able to talk to him in sign language. Does anyone know of any beginner classes in QLD that accept teenagers? Or if you’ve learnt Auslan yourself, how did you get started?

Hi, I am trying to self study Auslan, but i'm finding it very hard to find resources for northern dialect for NSW. Is there any resources that you guys have found helpful? I've heard of Auslan Wiz but I'm not sure whether it uses northern or southern dialect

hello!! i’m a HoH person (deaf in 1 ear and 1/2 deaf in my functional ear) and have given up on trying to access supports through the government in terms of learning Auslan, i was just wondering what are some good online courses for learning? i’ve done some research and DeafConnect seems reputable but i wanted to get community opinions before making any concrete decisions!!

I am a HoH and want to learn Auslan. I have been learning basic vocabulary from signbank but I think it would be useful to have media that is in both languages.

Ignoring the fact that this doesn't follow Auslan grammar and wouldn't be correct anyway, are these signs right?

I'm not fluent but I didn't recognise any of these signs beside earth. Looking on findsign, signbank and sign planet (the website I assumed they got these images from) I couldn't find the other 4 signs under the words listed. They could just be signs I haven't encountered but even then I wouldn't think 'prevail' has an Auslan semantic equivalent.

Unfortunately I don't have a better picture cause I haven't actually been to this school in person I just saw it on a post in a local Facebook group.

Given Auslan depends heavily on NMF, such as facial expression and mouth gestures, I assume she will simply have to exaggerate the rest of her body language and posture to make up for it?

Would she still be understood?

Hello! My name is August and I am learning some very basic signs as I am volunteering for Melbourne Fringe Festival this year. I am learning how to say ‘my name is August’ and had a couple of questions.
First of all - should I spell August as it is my name, or can I just use the sign for the month August
Also - is there a sign for ‘is’, because I am using Auslan dictionary and couldn’t find one and am wondering if that is just because it is superfluous in most phrases.

My two roommates are a couple and learning Auslan together. They are both hearing, and are learning it from a desire of curiosity and inclusion. They both started learning it before I knew them.

However, they will often swap to Auslan when I am around. I have no issue if this is in a bigger group and I have other people to talk to, but I find it disrespectful when it happens mid-conversation when the three of us are talking (such as chatting while cooking dinner). The dynamic that exists between us is that we do speak over each other at times, but I am finding myself more annoyed when it's in Auslan and I can't even understand the interruption. I also find it a bit uncomfortable when I can hear them talking in a shared space and I leave my room to come join them, and then they immediately switch to Auslan or a hybrid conversation.

I'm trying to navigate this in a respectful way, and I am supportive of them learning and practicing it at home! I know it is their place too and I'm not looking to police a common language, but I just wanted thoughts on if my feelings are out of line

Thank you in advance!

Hi, I recently got the opportunity to volunteer at a Deaf school near me, supporting Deaf children, starting next term. I am looking for any vocabulary signs that might be useful for working in a school?

I have a certificate III and I'm planning on doing certificate IV next year, I sign well but I'm worried about not knowing the right signs for a school setting.

E.g signs for math terms like multiply and divide have never been covered in my course. I can find a few different signs for divide on sign bank and I'm wondering which is used in SA. Any other school/ subject related signs I might need? (It's a primary school)

Also if there are any signs kids use that I might not have encountered interacting with Deaf adults. A classmate of mine with Deaf kids showed me the sign for Disney recently but I'm sure there are others.

If there is anyone with Deaf kids here, what are they talking about? What signs do they use?

Any help is appreciated. :)

im a hearing person, so what im noticing may not be how others or the deaf community sees it, but i wanted to share my perspective to hear what other people think or if they’ve come across this kind of behaviour.

ive noticed a lot of hearing people that i encounter use language such as “i want to be friends with a deaf person” as if deaf people are a token or talking about/asking about forming friendships with deaf people as if the primary goal is to be given a sign name by the deaf person. ive seen people asking that if they don’t get given a sign name within a few years of knowing a deaf person, does that mean the relationship is difficult to “persuade” to a higher level such as being best friends, to the point where they get given a sign name.

personally i find myself quite irritated by this behaviour, because the way i see it, they’re just interacting with hard of hearing and deaf people for the sole purpose of getting something out of them. i met some people once saying they wanted to make a friend with someone who was deaf, which is great and all, but its almost like deaf people are viewed as some kind of token friend, like they’re solely looking to be their friend just because they are deaf and not because they genuinely want to be friends.

what do other people think about this? is it okay if i correct them politely? do people see this as an issue?

Hello, I’ve always wanted in to learning auslan.
I noticed there are a lot of YouTube tutorials. Some from many years ago. This might sound silly but can I watch those or does auslan change? Do you have any recommendations in terms of resources to learn from? Ideally affordable plz.
Thanks !

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I'm looking specifically for left handed Auslan videos or social media accounts to improve my LH receptive skills.

Any recommendations are greatly appreciated!

I'm doing a school project around learning a basic Auslan greeting for a customer service setting. If you've got 5 minutes, could you please fill out this survey around your experience ? Completely anonymous and text based.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdroltMKZxo5Gdvpi6HVG1MWRU-NZfAbCVqqmmwQYLG8GGaMg/viewform?usp=sharing&ouid=111886201069641395661

Hello!

I’ve come on here to pick your brains a little bit. I’m currently a nursing student and a disability support worker. One of my clients is non-verbal and living with autism. We use some hand gestures to communicate, as well as an eye gaze screen. The main gestures are “more” (fist tapping in chest), “finish” (thumbs up moving back and forth) and then things like making a T for toilet and tapping your watch for time. Due to recent ndis changes we don’t currently have appointments with his speech pathologist to learn more about this communication.

I’m wanting to know, does this seem like the basics of auslan? I’ve seen an American mum communicating with her son and a comment mentioning that she’s not using ASL, but she’s actually using SEE which directly translates each word? Does Australia have different sign languages like this? And if so, what’s the best way to better myself with the most commonly used language. I’d love to continue to create an inclusive space as I move forward through the health care system.

Thanks everyone, enjoy your beautiful Sunday :)

hi everyone!! i’m currently learning AUSLAN in uni but due to some mix ups, im in the second level beginner course rather then the first level to learn basic signs and correct sentence structure etc. i’ve been using many apps to learn some of the basics to hopefully catch up to what i should’ve already learnt if i had done the first beginner course initially; but im not sure if these apps are similar to duolingo where its just teaching me signs rather then how to actually form correct sentences and the different nuances and such. so my question is would it be extremely difficult to learn the basics at the same time as something slightly more advanced? i have 12-13 weeks and during this time i have to have 2 conversations with a deaf teacher so im unsure if ill just make a fool of myself but i love sign language so much so i really want to learn it and be good. thanks for the help guys!! :)

edit: thankyou to everyone who educated me about the correct way to type “auslan” rather then “AUSLAN”, this was just a lapse in my understanding and i appreciate all the kind people who helped me out!! i will make sure to keep this in mind in future :)

Hi everyone 👋

I have recently started trying to learn basic Auslan and am looking for some guidance/direction from the community.

I recently had a non verbal patient who communicated via sign language. I lightheartedly spoke to him a little using the Auslan alphabet (all I knew at the time) and he was completely stoked. I was so touched by how much of an impact this had and instilled in me how important and valuable it is to know basic sign. Since then I have been trying to teach myself and my children (9YOF, 7YOF, 5YOM) Auslan.

So far I am just looking things up and revising using the Auslan Dictionary app (such an amazing resource!) and YouTube videos here and there, but feel like I need some more structured learning to help with actually conversing.

Are there any good video series etc that might be helpful for me?

Also - as someone who communicates via sign language, what are some valuable tips for hearing people like myself to know? What can I be doing to better support you?

Apologies if my terminology etc is not quite right - please educate me - I’m doing my best but am very new to this world. So sorry if I have hurt or offended anyone, please know that was never my intention ♥️

I made a program to practice fingerspelling comprehension. It continually generates words or random letters depending on the settings. e: Link is now below

In this video it's drilling the vowels. I find them very tricky!

I made it for myself but figured other people might be interested. I know the animation's a little janky but was wondering what people thought of the idea.

I know there's videos to practice but I really wanted something to help drill comprehension continually and with custom drills

There's a research project called AuslanSpell that's more polished. The research paper says it's going to be posted on signbank and the Apple App store but I haven't seen it posted yet.

e: I have the link if anyone's interested in trying it. Wasn't sure if there was against a rule but it doesn't seem to be. This is strictly a none commercial project:

https://fingerspell-app.fingerspell.workers.dev/

Hey all.

I'm seeking wisdom from the deaf community specifically.

I'm studying to be a teacher, and I am doing an assignment on inclusive education.

We have been given our case student - an inspiring young woman with Downs Syndrome. She came in and presented to our uni and told us the things she enjoyed about school, things she struggled with, and how the school helped her.

One of the things she disliked was clapping in the auditorium.
One of the alternative solutions I come up with in this assignment was that the whole school trials no-clapping assemblies, and do the Auslan version, which is like jazz-hands.
I'm getting mixed results over what the sign applause in Auslan is... the Auslan dictionary is saying it's just like clapping, whereas this video from NSW Government shows what I had in mind https://www.instagram.com/reels/C57m_znMHmB/
I am tempted to believe that that the sign I mean is ASL, though.

Anyway, I was working with my aunt who works in inclusion, and she flagged that doing that might be culturally inappropriate towards the deaf community.
I understand why the deaf community is protective over the language, but I wanted to check whether this was something that would be tonedeaf (pun not intended).

Thanks all.