The Ability of Deaf Students to Understand Text: A Comparison of the Perceptions of Teachers and Students

Abstract

Sixteen deaf high school students and nine of their teachers, two deaf and seven hearing, were interviewed for their perceptions of the interest and difficulty of three types of text. Students read and retold the texts and reported on their use of metacognitive strategies and comprehension monitoring and assessment. In this paper, we compare the perceptions of the teachers and students. The teachers in this study underestimated the extent to which their students could comprehend independently, often based on insubstantial evidence. The text perceived to be most difficult by both teachers and students was also considered the most interesting to students, but not to teachers. This text also fostered the greatest use of a variety of metacognitive strategies, suggesting that difficult materials should not be avoided or simplified for deaf students.