Customer Reviews

Sign Language Made Simple

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I checked this book out from my local library and I'm enjoying it so much, I'm considering buying it. I have just completed a 4 month American Sign Language course and I found this book to use as a study guide. I have to admit that I find their method of teaching Sign confusing. But I think this is particularly due to the fact that the book incorporates ASL and Exact English (my class instructor was very against the use of Exact English). However as I work through the book, I enjoy that they show both forms of Sign. Particularly since I am interested in becoming an interpreter myself someday and will need to know both. I find the chapter reviews to be excellent - very helpful. An additional plus is the set up of the reviews that give you quick reference to where the signs can be located in the book plus memory aids for the signs. I wouldn't recommend this book as your only tool for studying the language, but I would highly recommend it as an additional tool.

My daughter had the first edition of this book and we had enjoyed working with that. Yet, when we received the second edition it was more compatible to American Sign Language, deleting many of the incidental words (the, to, a, etc.)The review exercises at the end of each lesson offer focused practice on the signs already learned. This enables the reader to quickly use the new words in actual conversation. Although just learning, I have been able to converse somewhat with hearing impaired friends.

This book is very helpful for starting to learn sign language, but truth of the matter is, all deaf people sign somewhat differently. No matter how much you try to learn, unless you actually communicate with a deaf person who will correct your signing, it's useless. It is a good place to start learning English Sign (uses alot of initialization). I do recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn, but I even more recommend immersing yourself in the deaf culture.

This book is great. We were able to communicate with a deaf person (limited of course) with just the first two lessons. Rather than learning each word individually, like you would with a dictionary, you learn in sentences. We really enjoy our sign language class using this book. It makes learning SL fun.

A Student of SL

Although no book can offer a 100% benefit relative to actual signing, this book is not cluttered, nor is it difficult to understand. Colloquialisms play an important facet to American Sign Language, so this book too will appeaer to be biased depending on one's own locale. Signs are used in context compared to others who categorize signs such as "animals, family relationships, etc." The author concedes the fact that not all words necessarily have a universal sign. I have used this book for instruction and it has been very successful.

This book has been in my personal library for 10 years. Rather than learning words independently, signing is learned in sentence form. This greatly aids in the retention of the signs. You can begin conversing from lesson one. Easy to follow directions and graphics show how to make the signs. Fingerspelling practice drills are given at the end of each lesson. This book will put you on your way to being a proficient signer.

I teach ASL at a college level. I would still recommend this book to everyone who is interested in learning sign language, but who does not have constant contact with Deaf people, or limited occassions at a work place. The format of learning elementary to more complex sentences (and the vocabulary along the way) puts the didactic and practical together in one easy to use resource. It comes with a comparatively inexpensive DVD with all of the chapters in visual format. I think it's one of the best for non-ASL users.

I admire the other reviewers who were able to learn from this book and who found it useful for their purposes. As for myself, I found the graphic design very confusing: the point of view shifts with every word, from hands alone, to face, to head and above, to chest, as well as from the side to the front.

Furthermore, the book is most useful to learn Signed English (or as this book calls it, Pidgin Sign English). I am more interested in learning American Sign Language, because I have an interest in the grammatical structure of other languages and because it's a more dominant form of communication between deaf persons.

The information content is dense and presented in complete sentences, so if you can get past the graphic presentation and if learning ASL isn't important to you, this could be a good book for your purposes.

I own many Sign Language books (textbooks, dictionaries, etc.) and I found this book a wonderful resource to help beginners to sign sentences right away instead of looking up each word in an sign language dictionary.

It was immediately evident the instructor had done her homework when recommending this book for the beginners. I jumped right into it. This book makes it easy to learn. It lives up to its title. The group I'm with made it fun. Something new, exciting and useful for the New Year.