ABSTRACT
The DfES website (2002) reports the following about deaf people and their education:
There are 8 million people in the UK with some form of hearing loss. Deafness at birth or in childhood has significant effects on the learning of basic skills and this affects 180,000 people in the UK. A further 500,000 people become severely or profoundly deaf later in life. For them, deafness does not in itself create a need for basic skills, but those who wish to acquire basic skills might find it difficult to access appropriate provision. There are two important subgroups of deaf learners: those who use British Sign Language (BSL) as their preferred language and those who use speech and lipreading. Although the best medium of instruction is different for each group, the required strategies for teaching and learning are similar. The last survey of deaf school leavers was in 1979. It found that the average reading age for all deaf learners was 8.6. This situation has not improved. (paragraph 35)
