Study title

This project on multiliteracies involved groups of deaf learners in India, Uganda, and Ghana, both in primary schools and with young adult learners. The Peer-to-Peer Deaf Multiliteracies project examined how some of the dynamics that contribute to learners’ marginalisation can be changed by involving deaf individuals in the design of new teaching approaches, and by using children and young people's lived experiences and existing multilingual-multimodal skills as the starting point for theme-based learning. The aim was for participants to develop not only English literacy, but "multiliteracies", i.e. skills in sign languages, ICT, written English, creative expression through drawing and acting, and other forms of multimodal communication. The data collection includes reports from classroom settings compiled by tutors and by research assistants, pre-and post-tests on language and literacy abilities with learners, samples from an online learning platform, and multimedia portfolios collected from learners. A total of 124 young deaf adults and 79 deaf primary school children took part in the researchThe exclusion of deaf children and young adults from access to school systems in the developing world results in individuals and communities being denied quality education; this not only leads to unemployment, underemployment, low income, and a high risk of poverty, but also represents a needless waste of human talent and potential. To target this problem, this project extends work conducted under a pilot project addressing issues of literacy education with young deaf people in the Global South. Creating, implementing and evaluating our innovative intervention based on the peer teaching of English literacy through sign language-based tutoring, everyday real life texts such as job application forms, and the use of a bespoke online resource, enabled us to generate a sustainable, cost-effective and learner-directed way to foster literacy learning amongst deaf individuals. To...