UDL Revisited

Earlier tonight, we took the Guinea Pigs to a production at a local playhouse of James and the Giant Peach.

We go pretty regularly to various productions at this and several other local playhouses, and when I ordered the tickets several months ago, I didn't much focus on the details of the write-up.  I rather came late to the Roald Dahl party -- he wasn't very well known, back in the day when I was myself a tot.  I read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and I remember the Oompa-Loompas' song to Mike Teavee making an impression, even then.  That was about it.  But when Guinea Pig #1 was nine or so, she ripped through about ten Dahl books in straight succession; and shortly thereafter Guinea Pig #2's teacher read Peach aloud in class; and over the years I've read Matilda and Elevator to one or the other of the younger Pigs.  And everyone's a fan.  So when I saw the Peach production on the Playhouse schedule, I just clicked through cheerfully without much thinking.

I didn't really notice, for example, that this particular production was being put on by the Signstage Theatre, from Cleveland.  

In Signstage productions, about half of the actors are speaking and about half are deaf.  Each character has a voice -- sometimes the actor's own; sometimes another actor's piped in from offstage or even spoken by someone else onstage.  Any time there are any spoken words, somebody on stage -- not necessarily the character who's got the action -- is signing what's said.

It sounds a little complicated, but it worked.

The kids were riveted.  Not just mine; throughout the place.  Which was, by the way, packed.

And it was fascinating.  Before the play began, kids throughout the theatre were poring over the program and signing their names out by letter, using the sign alphabet that had helpfully been printed in it:

Once the show began, kids stared rapt at the signing actors; some of them, including my son, unconsciously moving their own fingers to mimic the actors' movements.

After it was over, we headed next door to Paul Newman's restaurant for dinner, where there were a handful of other families whose kids, like ours, were still clutching their programs and signing out "secret codes" to each other.

Pretty neat.

It reminded me of two other things, which combined with the Signstage experience morphed into a little Education of Pam unit on Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles enacted for the deaf population yield benefits to the population at large:

The First Connection: On our trip to Florida last month, we took the Pigs to a Polynesian Luau at SeaWorld.  (You know... geography lesson.)  We were seated next to a delightful young woman who turned out to be a deaf interpreter ASL Interpreting Services.  She was scoping out the luau because she was going to be interpreting it a few days later, for a conference that planned to attend the show.

A conference of...

dentists.

One of whom, evidently, was deaf.

It turns out that she does a great deal of "show" work; that a lot of entertainment businesses  go out of their way to make their shows accessible to the hearing-impaired.  She spoke particularly highly of Disney, which evidently is known throughout the deaf community for having interpreters available for all its shows, for providing interpreters for the duration of any Disney cruise on which there is even one hearing-impaired passengers, and for training interpreters to be truly integrated into the song-and-dance revues, rather than merely standing to the side signing the language.  Which in turn brought to mind:

The Second Connection: More years ago than I care to recount, here, one of my college friends rounded me up to attend a concert by the a capella group Sweet Honey in the Rock.  (If you're not familiar with their music, follow the links out to their recordings, or follow the message from founder Berenice Johnson Reagon to her site, to hear clips.)

Check out the woman dressed in black, second to left.  Shirley Childress Saxton.

She doesn't sing.

She signs.

She's been a member of the group for... well, that was more than twenty years ago.  It's a small group.  She doesn't sing.

Why, I wondered, as they first came on stage, regal, straight-backed, dressed in bright African robes and towering hats; and she took her position and started signing, would a deaf person come to a concert?

But after I'd seen about two songs, I got it.  You'd come to see this group.  Precisely because it is accessible.  Saxton is a wonder.  It's an a capella group.  The women aren't singing the same words at the same time.  Saxton has to pick out one line that she's going to follow, and it's fascinating to watch -- she doesn't necessarily pick out voice carry the melody, or the loudest voice, or the voice whose lyrics are moving the most.  She doesn't stay with the same voice throughout a whole song, either.  She signs phrases, following this singer for a bit, then moving over to the next, then coming back.  Occasionally she just opens and closes her fist, in time with one of the thrumming, wordless, vocalizing parts that are keeping the beat.

All the while, she's swaying, leaning in and away, sometimes watching the singers, often looking out at the audience.

Poetry in motion.

Literally.

I wish I could put up a video clip; sometimes words really don't do it justice.

P.S.  Check out Roald Dahl's own website for loads of book-related games, fun facts, biographical tidbits, and lesson plans on the books for middle school teachers.