ASL Awareness
Mrs. VanBeek, the ASL class here at IKE - Many people don’t know of her class being a language class and also a CTE course. For a few weeks now, there have been signs up around school promoting ASL - but this class isn’t just about the credit on your transcript, not just the test coming in a week, and it sure as heck isn’t a silent class. This class is full of life, memories, growth, and a sense of family.
Mrs. Vanbeek is very passionate not only about the language itself, but also her students and their overall well-being on top of it all - “ASL is a culture-driven language, along with the classroom of how I teach, I think it’s important that we protect it [ASL] because it gives the kids confidence. At the beginning, they either refuse or just struggle to present and get in front of their peers. By about the middle of their first and second years, my kids started volunteering to go. When my students get comfortable in their own skin, it makes me want to have more and more classes like this.” She also states that yes all of your other classes are important, “but students who are put in front of a screen 24/7 don’t know how to have that interaction with the human face to face - it is amazing to see them go from absolute screenagers for the first couple weeks, to a couple months later now to the point where now they come in five minutes before the bell and I don’t see phones. The relationships that build are what we need more of - which is why I am hopeful this program can continue.”
Their teacher says she uses ASL in almost every aspect of her life. She used it growing up because of family members, “I know that my students, when they leave my classroom, if they have even some signing capabilities, a job might offer fifty to a dollar more just by having that ability to communicate with other people.”
Our ASL teacher puts her heart and soul into her work, but also how and why she does it. Mrs. VanBeek is a teacher who is truly passionate about her work alongside the students who participate with her.
