Pupils discover sounds of silence Sign language expert at museum

BANGOR – Not everyone can get the attention of a little boy or girl without saying a word.

But for Carrie Pierce, doing so on Sunday afternoon was child’s play.

There was lots of play going on Sunday at the Maine Discovery Museum in Bangor, with many children squealing, crawling, squirming, climbing and giggling throughout the three floors of exhibits at the downtown building.

In a side room on the first floor, however, things were a little more sedate as Pierce quietly held the rapt, if fleeting, attention of a group of youngsters.

Pierce, using visual aids such as a large white teddy bear, drawings, and puzzles, was teaching children American Sign Language.

Deaf since birth, Kenduskeag native Pierce read lips and talked to get through high school.

She didn’t learn sign language until the age of 18 but now prefers using it because she can more easily see the communication and doesn’t miss out on what might be going on around her.

Now 32, Pierce lives in Hampden and uses a Master’s Degree in Deaf Education from Gallaudet University in Washington to teach sign language to students of all ages.

On Sunday, Pierce held up her hands to show a group of children how to position their fingers and move their hands to make the signs for various letters and numbers.

The pupils looked back and forth from their hands to hers as they tried to copy her movements.

A few minutes after demonstrating some signs by putting her arms through the sleeves of a shirt wrapped around a large white teddy bear, Pierce approached a girl sitting by herself on a nearby bench. She gestured to the girl but the girl didn’t know what to make of Pierce’s interest in her.

“I don’t have a clue,” the girl said.

Pierce turned away but within seconds had returned to the bench with a homemade deck of cards. She and the girl started playing “Go Fish,” taking turns asking each other for cards with certain numbers on them by making hand signs of the numbers they wanted.

Other activities at the event included children using rubber stamps to spell out their names in sign language, solving simple crossword and connect-the-dot puzzles with sign language clues, and completing a puzzle by matching wooden pieces with hand signs painted on them with spaces marked by the corresponding letters.

For Susan Iverson of Old Town, who brought her three-year-old daughter Mia to the session, learning sign language is like learning any foreign language.

She said she hopes her daughter will develop a sound “understanding of the world” by knowing multiple languages.

“She does some signing in school,” Iverson said.

Karen Thomes, a preschool teacher at Indian Island School who attended the session with a friend, said that some autistic children have an easier time communicating with sign language than they do with spoken words.

“It depends on the child,” she said. “It’s amazing to me how easily children pick it up.”

Pierce answered questions Sunday by writing answers down in a notebook. Before providing information about herself, however, she set one issue straight with a written statement.

She wants to be called “deaf,” she indicated. Do not use the term “hearing impaired.”

“The media tends to misuse it and we don’t like it because it implies we are broken and need to be fixed,” she wrote.

Jennifer Chiarell, MDM’s marketing director, said Sunday that Pierce’s appearance was one of several sign language events that have been scheduled at the museum. In late March and early April, Pierce will teach sign language classes for babies at the museum on four consecutive Tuesdays, she said.

More information about the programs is available by calling the museum at 262-7200 or by visiting www.mainediscoverymuseum.org on the Internet.