Preparing to Watch TV: A Training Model for Accessing Captions for Students who are Deaf

Abstract

Adding captions to televised programs was a media modification to enable accessibility of television to people with restricted access to the audio components, such as those who are deaf or hard-of hearing. Captioned television for the deaf is becoming quite common. In the United States, television captions are generally in written English; however, the English literacy rate among people who are deaf is quite low. Therefore, this research explored a way to make captioned television usable by its intended audience. An instructional method was implemented among a group of junior high school students who are deaf, to train them to be attentive to certain types of information by facilitating their acquisition of knowledge and critical viewing. The initial implementation of the training suggests a need for improving deaf students' access to their prior knowledge to apply to reading comprehension and language related skills. The results of the two-week training of no increase in captioning comprehension bring into question the issue of true accessibility and the utility of the format of captioning as presently developed.