ASL 111-01 American Sign Language Level I

Course Description
This accelerated course is designed for students with no or minimal American Sign Language
(ASL) proficiency. In this introductory course, students will develop basic skills in the use of
American Sign Language and introductory knowledge of Deaf Culture. This course will begin to
prepare students for social interaction and academic discourse at Gallaudet University.
Emphasis is upon acquisition of comprehension, production and interactional skills using basic
grammatical features. ASL will be taught within contexts and related to general surroundings
and everyday life experiences at Gallaudet.

Course Outcomes
Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:
Learn and use a targeted core of vocabulary
Learn and use basic grammatical features
Produce 5 to 7 sentences - and short narratives
Learn to express the basic structure of narratives in ASL
Demonstrate their knowledge on some current controversial issues within Deaf
Culture and Deaf community.

Teaching Methods
Total Physical Response: See Week 1 Class 2 Grammar Activity/Contrastive Structure
(30 minutes) point to any objects in classroom. Establishing spatial referents and then
referring to them using body shift with appropriate agreement between the body shift and
the referent as you contrast: role shift
Communicative Language Teaching: Interactive Activity (30 minutes) How much do
you have? See ACTIVITY 15.2 Developing comprehension skills by using narrative
activities and it includes receptive skills through actions by using TPR.
Task-Based Language Teaching: Interactive Activity (40 minutes) see ACTIVITY
15.7 Pairs of students would be able to negotiate using ASL at the Flea Markets. The task
is having one student show the objects and convince another student to purchase at a
desired price. And the other student who is buying would try to reduce the price as much
as possible. The basis of this task to apply their experience in real world context.

Unit Overview
Vocabulary
 Week 1 Sell Check
Hundred Free Coupon
Thousand Borrow Credit card
Million Owe Entrepreneurship
Billion Cost Week 2
Dollar Worth Negotiate
Cent Value Hotel
One-cent Count Ticket
Five-cent Free Spend
Ten- cent Cheap Lexicalized
Twenty-five-cent Expensive Fingerspelling:
dollar Earn #Flea-Market
#Hostel
One-dollar Deposit
#Bank
Five-dollars Withdraw
#Cash
Ten- dollars Put-in-Bank
#ATM
Twenty dollar Save
Pay
Buy

Fingerspelling and Numbers

Lexicalized fingerspelling: Bank, Cash and ATM
Money signs
Type of Coins
Grammar
Indicating verbs
Describe verbs in classifiers - ATM in machine, small/large stack of bills, shapes of coin
and other currency.
Contrastive structure
Use to space to compare monetary value
Rhetorical Question - how much?
Topic comment
ASL Depiction
Descriptive Classifiers (DCL), known as size and shape specifiers, (SASSes)
Whole Entity and Descriptive Classifiers
ASL Articulator
Descriptive Classifiers (DCL), known as size and shape specifiers, (SASSes)
ASL Semantic
Signs using different non-manual signal showing different context
 CL:LL
Temporal Aspect using reduplication, intense, durational, and interve
Language, Culture, and Communication
Opening conversations starting with about the news of purchasing a house.
Closing conversations with appropriate respond - wow, good deal, good advice, I will
start looking for.. and good start.

Unit Outline
WEEK UNIT 15 Activities/ACTFL Homework/ACTFL

1 15.1: How to Sign Money in ASL Practice sign new vocabularies

C4.2: Approximately/About/Estimate C1.1: Store Activity

1 15.2: How Much? C1.2: Short Shopping

Narrative

1 15.3: Money Worksheet C2.2 Deaf Entrepreneurship

C5.1 Deaf Tax

2 15.4: Price Comparison C3.2 Poker Lawsuit Article

2 15.5: Shopping Items C1.3: Your Monthly Budget

15.6: Store Brand C4.1: Money- International
signs

2 15.7 Flea Market Prepare your final Presentation

3 Review Unit 15 Create Presentation

3 Unit 15 Test: Presentation C5.2 Communities Activity

3 Silent Supper

Unit Outcome Chart

Unit Outcome Aligned with Aligned with
At the end of the unit, the student will be able to: Week Course ACTFL
Outcomes Standards
 1) Attribute the
functions, grammar, core vocabulary, and 1, 2 & 3 1.1, 1.3, 3.2, 4.1
conversation behaviors related to counting money and
shopping.

2) Demonstrate the ability of using ASL negotiating for the 1, 2 & 3 4.1 & 4.2
best price and international sign for MONEY.

3) Identify and define the aspects of Deaf Culture with 3 1.2, 5.1 & 5.2
money.

Lesson Outcome Chart (Learning Objectives)

Lesson Outcome Lesson Activity Lesson Assessment Aligned Aligned with ACTFL
At the end of the lesson, students with Course Standards
Outcomes
will be able to:

1) Learn core vocabulary related Home: Classifiers Vocabulary 1, 2 1.1, 1.2

to money. and proximity HW # 1
space using
indexing and non-
manual signal

2) Express using classifiers to Money and Vocabulary: 1 3.1, 4.1

locate objects in the classroom Objects with Money &
and Flea market Classifiers for Objects in the
proximity space,
classroom.
HW#2

3) Learn about Deaf-friendly Profession and 1,2 & 3 1.3, 2.1, 2.2
restaurant and hiring Deaf Culture HW#3
workers.

4) Express using non-manual Grammar: Rhetorical 1,2 & 3 1.1, 4.2

signal related with oo mm, Rhetorical Questions and
cha cs mm and ah. Question Topic-Comment

5) Learn and use temporal Money: Temporal 3, 4 5.1, 3.2, 1.2

aspect: recurring, intense, Aspect and
duration, and interval. numbers HW #4
 ASL National Standards
One of the ACTFL examples is Deaf Entrepreneurship (Culture 2.2). The students would learn
about how Deaf business owners usually hire other Deaf people. The goal of using national
standards in this course is to expand students knowledge about Deaf culture and its real-world
applications, not limited to learning the sign language in classrooms.

COMMUNICATION
C1.1: Store Activity
C1.2: Short Shopping Narrative
C1.3: Your Monthly Budget
CULTURES
C2.1 Tip etiquette
C2.2 Deaf Entrepreneurship
CONNECTIONS
C3.1: Money conversion
C3.2 Poker Lawsuit
COMPARISONS
C4.1: Money- International signs
C4.2: Approximately/About/Estimate
COMMUNITIES
C5.1: Tax businesses provide services to Deaf people
C5.2: Patronize Deaf businesses ie Deaf Expo annually

Materials and Equipment

 We will be using the Blackboard course management system. Blackboard will be
used to post announcements, course handouts, lecture notes, assignments, and
any changes in syllabus, expectations. It will be updated regularly. Blackboard will
use students Gallaudet email addresses to send out notifications. IMPORTANT: If you do not
regularly check your Gallaudet email but prefer to use an alternative private email address,
please set up email-forwarding for your Gallaudet email to your private email. This will ensure
you will not miss any messages that might be sent out by Blackboard from your instructor. You
are ultimately responsible for all information that is sent through Blackboard.

Kahoot!. (n.d.). Retrieved July 18, 2016, from https://kahoot.it/

We will use Kahoot for our classroom/lab. The instructions on how to use Kahoot
can be found at this website: https://getkahoot.com/how-it-works

Lesson Procedure

Activity 15.1: How to Sign Money in ASL

Activity 15.2: How much do you have?
Activity 15.3: Money worksheet
Activity 15.4: Price Comparison
Activity 15.5: Shopping Items
Activity 15.6: Store Brand
Activity 15.7: Flea Market

Assignment

We recognize that learning a new language cannot happen in the classroom

 environment alone. The ASL classes & Lab provide a nurturing environment for
students at any level! We provide teacher assistants to support students in
developing language skills and cultural knowledge.
The Lab has a Library Resource Center to help guide students with finding material
to improve targeted skills. Sign Language students will have access to technology
and resources necessary to complete assignments and tasks.
Students will work individually, in pairs, and or groups. One-on-one tutoring
sessions are provided through our ASL tutoring program as well as our Lab
assistants.
The students are required to attend ASL lab for 30 minutes after ASL classes and
submit homework as instructed.

Unit 15 : Money

In this unit students learn core vocabulary

related to money, store, and business. Also,
learn about how to manage money using
grammar structure; purchase and spending.

Lesson Plan

Week 1 Class 1

Roll Call (5 minutes) Tomorrow weather what?

Introduce Vocabulary (10 minutes): hundred, thousand, million, billion, cent,
one-cent, five-cents, ten-cent, twenty-five-cents, dollar, one-dollar, five-dollars,
ten-dollars, twenty dollars.
 Receptive Activity (20 minutes) How to Sign Money in ASL See ACTIVITY
15.1
Introduce vocabulary (20 minutes) Pay, buy sell, free, borrow, owe, cost, worth,
value, count.
Grammar Activity (20 minutes) Grammar Structure Students will learn ASL
grammatical structure with (C4.2) Approximately/About/Estimate.
Wrap-Up (5-10 minutes) Review todays vocabulary.
Homework Practice new vocabulary for the next class.

Week 1 Class 2
Class Lesson:
Roll Call (5 minutes) What is your favorite candy?
Review (10 minutes)
Interactive Activity (30 minutes) How much do you have? See ACTIVITY 15.2
Introduce Vocabulary (10 minutes) : Free, cheap and expensive
Grammar Activity (10 minutes) Contrastive Structure: point to any objects in
classroom. Establishing spatial referents and then referring to them using body shift
with appropriate agreement between the body shift and the referent as you contrast:
role shift ie: point to table in classroom cost $20 point to another item chaircost
$5
Wrap up (5 minutes)
Homework: (C1.2) Short Shopping Narrative Students will have to create a
short narrative about which store they would shop at and how they would spend
their money on then upload in GoReact.
Review todays vocabulary

Week 1 Class 3

Roll Call (5 minutes) What is your first job?

Review (10 minutes)
Introduce Vocabulary (10 minutes)
Earn, deposit, withdraw, Put-in-Bank, save, #ATM, check, coupon,
#CASH, credit card, #BANK, entrepreneurship
Interactive Activity (25 minutes) Money Worksheet see ACTIVITY 15.3
Video-Narrative (25 minutes) Teacher leads Q/A session
ASL Depiction & ASL Semantic (20 minutes)
CL:LL : Synonymous Meaning
Wrap up (5 minutes): (C5.1) Discuss Deaf Tax and homework
Homework: Entrepreneurship: (C2.2) Read ASL at WORK pg. 445 research
 and list 5 different Deaf entrepreneurship in America.

Week 2 Class 4

Roll Call (5 minutes) Favorite Restaurant

Review Activity (10 minutes)
Interaction Activity (25 minutes) (C2.1) Tip etiquette -(10 minutes)
Receptive Activity (C1.2) Video-Story - Q/A session
Students watch Youtube Deaf Chef Kurt about tipping. (find link) Q/A.
Interaction Activity (20 minutes)
Money - International Signs Activity 15.4: Price Comparison
Fingerspelling Activity (20 minutes)
Different types of Coins.
Wrap up (5 minutes)
Homework: (C3.2) Poker Lawsuit Article: discuss about deaf patrons who
attended a casino and they were removed from this site because deaf people uses
sign language and was considered cheating the game. A summary report in ASL at
GoReact.

Week 2 Class 5

Roll Call (5 minutes)

Review (10 minutes)
Interaction Activity (10 minutes)
Discuss last nights homework (Poker Lawsuit from a Deaf Patron)
Interaction Activity (30 minutes) see Activity 15.5: Shopping Items
Receptive Activity (20 minutes) see Activity 15.6: Store Brand
Introduce Vocabulary (20 minutes)
#flea market and negotiate
Wrap up (10 minutes) Discuss about presentation
Homework: (C4.1) Find three different International Signs for MONEY and what
is their (C3.1) money conversion. Use Sign Language on Goreact.

Week 2 Class 6

Roll call (5 minutes)

Review (10 minutes)
 Interaction Activity (40 minutes) see Activity 15.7: Flea Market
Wrap up (10 minutes) quiz tomorrow on Kahoot
Homework: (C1.3) Your Monthly Budget on GoReact

Week 3 Class 7
Review Day
Roll Call (5 minutes)
Kahoot (5 minutes to set up and ~30 minutes to do the quiz):
Students show their Kahoot quizzes with the class as a part of the review activity
Review Unit 15 (45 minutes to 1 hour): Review contents in Unit 15
Lab (30 minutes):
Study Group

Week 3 Class 8
Unit 15 Test
Roll Call (5 minutes)
Unit 15 Test (75 minutes)
Homework (C5.2) Communities Activity

Week 3 Class 9

Silent Supper (90 minutes)

Activities
ACTIVITY 15.1

TITLE: How to Sign Money in ASL

PURPOSE: Students will have a better understanding of money in ASL through practice.
DESCRIPTION: The video demonstrate variety of signs for money.
MATERIALS: YouTube: How to Sign Money in ASL - American Sign Language.
Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DF-tsmq5e8Q

ACTIVITY 15.2

TITLE: How much do you have?

PURPOSE: Students will learn about the money unit and how to have a
conversation/asking how much with people.
DESCRIPTION:
1. An instructor will bring fake money to the classroom.
2. Students will have 20 minutes to practice.
3. Students will partner up and practice on asking how much do you have in cent,
and dollars)
MATERIALS: Fake Money

ACTIVITY 15.3
TITLE: Money Worksheet
PURPOSE: Students will use targeted language in receptive and comprehensive signing
skill.
DESCRIPTION:
1. I will give worksheets 1 and 2 to students.
2. Student A will write answers in worksheet 1 only.
3. Student B will write answers in worksheet 2 only.
4. I will start with Exercise 1 and students will work in pairs.
5. Student B will ask Student A for price of an item (ie: hamburger). Student will tell
the price.
6. Next Exercise, students will do the same procedure with worksheet 2.
7. In large group, I will ask for price of an item. Student will tell us the price.

MATERIALS:
Students A/B handouts
Exercise 1 Worksheet 1 Exercise 2 Worksheet 2
 ACTIVITY 15.4
TITLE: Prices Comparison
PURPOSE: Students will understand the correct ASL structure: asking questions,
respond, sign parameters.
DESCRIPTION:
1. I will show a picture of two items and prices on the slide.
2. I will sign one item and price then sign second item and price using contrastive
structure in Wh-Question.
3. Students will answer which is cheap and which is expensive.

ACTIVITY 15.5
TITLE: Shopping Items
PURPOSE: Students will use receptive and expressive signing skills in interactive
activity.
DESCRIPTION:
1. I will split students in groups A and B.
2. I will pass out Student A worksheet to students in Group A and Student B
worksheet to students in Group B.
3. A student in Group A will ask a student in Group B and ask for prices of two items
only, then go to a different student and ask for prices of two different items.
Student A will continue the same procedure until the student finish writing down
prices for all items.

MATERIALS:
 Student A Student B

ACTIVITY 15.6
TITLE: Store Brands
PURPOSE: Students will use the receptive skills in reading fingerspelling, prices, and
additional information.
DESCRIPTION and MATERIALS:
1. Student will go to GoReact and view my video - instruction of assignment in
GoReact (please see the link) https://youtu.be/oP2qhzFvUjA
2. Student will watch my signing of a situation.
3. Student will answer the questions following the instruction.
4. Student worksheet
 ACTIVITY 15.7
TITLE: Flea Market
PURPOSE: Students practice expressive and receptive ASL of how to use money and
negotiate people by purchasing an object at the flea market.
DESCRIPTION:
1. The instructor will hand out papers detailing instructions with three different
pictures of objects.
2. Students work in pairs.
3. Instruct students on how to play the game of negotiating and buying objects.
4. Students decide on who will be running the business and who will be the buyer.
One will be the buyer at the flea market for ten minutes and then vice versa for
another ten minutes.
5. Students will start negotiating on how much they want to spend/sell/calculate
discount/sales.
MATERIALS: Handouts.

Assessment
Grading Distribution and Letter Grade Equivalent
 Letter GPA Definition Percent
Grade Value Range

A 4.0 Outstanding 100-94

A- 3.7 94-90

B+ 3.5 89-87

B 3.0 Good 86-84

B- 2.7 83-80

C+ 2.5 79-77

C 2.0 Unsatisfactory 76-74

C- 1.7 73-70

F 0.0 Failing 69 or below

XF 0.0 Academic
integrity policy
violation

Summary Breakdown Grade Total:

GoReact Videos - 10%
Lab Kahoot - 10% 20%
Presentations Presentation - 20% 20%

Quiz Comprehension quiz - 20%

Production quiz - 20%
40%
Test 20% 20%
TOTAL 100%

Presentation Assignment (20%)

Students will do presentations in class
Teacher will assign presentation criteria in Blackboard for each unit
Students will work on rough draft in Lab block time and upload their draft to
GoReact. Students will give peer feedback on other students rough draft
 presentation
Students will receive feedback from teacher via GoReact
On presentation day - teacher will record students presentation in class. Students
presentation grade will be posted in students GoReact.
Lab (20%)
Students are required to attend lab after class. If the students do not attend, it will impact
their grades. Students must complete the assignments in the lab. Any assignments that are
not completed within the lab time frame will be deduced 10% for each class that it is late.
GoReact Videos (10%)
Students will be assigned video presentations for each unit.
Unit 15 GoReact assignment - 1.5%
Specific instructions will be given in class.
The videos must be recorded via www.goreact.com by the due date.
Review the Videotaped Homework Guidelines for GoReact below to
ensure quality work.
Grading rubric and instructors feedbacks are provided on the GoReact
platform upon completion of this assignment.
Kahoot (10%)
Students will be assigned groups, and each group will collaborate on
developing interactive via Kahoot.
Kahoot quizzes must be related to the unit covered at the time.
Peer-assignments and instructions will be given during lab hour.
Unit quiz (40%)
These tests consists of two portions: Comprehension Test and Production Test.
Attendance is required to take these tests. Tests will cover the contents
demonstrated in the ASL at Work textbook, lectures, handouts, and reading
assignments. There are no-make up policy due to time constraint. Instead, the
lowest test will be dropped.
Comprehension Tests (20%):
This is a test where the instructor(s) will sign from the assigned unit.
Students will demonstrate their comprehension skills of the ASL
signed and write down in equivalent English.
Production Tests (20%):
Students will demonstrate their ASL skills learned in class by
producing ASL dialogues incorporating vocabulary and grammar
structure learned in a particular unit.
Students will be given a dialogue script on the day of the test.
Students will be given some time to read through and rehearse the
dialogue before being called on to demonstrate the dialogue to the
instructor(s). The dialogue will include vocabulary and grammar
that has been covered in the unit up until that point.

Final Exam (20%)

The final exam is focused on production and comprehensive portions. Cumulative in
nature; comprehension and production are included along with information from the
workbook, readings, presentations, lab, quizzes, lectures, videotapes shown both in and out
of class, class assignments (grammar, vocabulary, classifiers and proximity space using
indexing and non-manual signal, functions of ASL), and discussions. There will be no
make-up of the final exam except under special circumstances.

Rubric for Homework in GoReact

References
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Clementi, D & Terrill, L (2013). The keys to planning for Learning. Alexandria, VA: The
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Cockey, S. W. (Ed.). (2014). Planning instruction teaching world languages: A practical

guide (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: National Capital Language Resource Center.

Kahoot!. (n.d.). Retrieved December 13, 2016, from https://kahoot.it/

Newell, W., Sanders, C. A., Holcomb, B.R., Holcomb, S. K., Caccamise, F., & Peterson, R.
(2010). ASL at work: teacher manual. San Diego, CA: DawnSignPress.

Richards, J. & Rodgers, T. (2014). Approaches and methods in language teaching.

Cambridge NY: Cambridge University Press.