A Day in the Life…Educational Sign Language Interpreter

“Are you pregnant?”

There was a brief moment of silence before the music teacher slowly turned to face me. I could see the familiar look in her eyes reflecting several layers of shock. She was new at the school and did not even know me. Flash cards of adjectives she thought about me at that moment shuffled through my mind.

Grinning, I casually lifted my hand to point at the Deaf student standing in line. It wasn’t registering.

I leaned in to whisper, “This student was asking the question, not me.” It took another second before her eyes left mine and gazed over to where I pointed. I could see that she was still confused but seemed to grasp the idea that I was merely the message bearer.

“Um, no, I’m not,” she slowly replied, glancing back at me as my hands began to form her answer into American Sign Language for the student.

I’m used to it after almost nine years of being an Educational Sign Language Interpreter. In fact, that was one of my easier moments.

The process of becoming a sign language interpreter is challenging to begin with.

Educational interpreters must pass a performance assessment on their skills before being awarded certification.

In a preschool classroom in Phoenix, Arizona where I was evaluated, I sat in a miniature preschool chair watching a video where I had to voice what was being signed on the screen. My legs began to itch fiercely and I clawed at them while trying to maintain my attention to the screen.

Afterwards, I noticed tiny red bites all over my legs and showed the test administrator. He concluded that there were fleas or some other unknown on the carpet of that room. Yeah, they actually put preschoolers on that carpet…

What is the role of a sign language interpreter anyway?

I’ll give you the condensed definition (sort of):

A sign language interpreter is not only fluent in American Sign Language but must serve as a language facilitator between a Deaf/Hard of Hearing (HH) individual and the hearing world, which may include educating others on the cultural differences between the two worlds.

The National Deaf Center adds that, “They must understand the meaning and intentions expressed in one language and express those meanings and intentions in the other language. Interpreters must be able to retain information and manage the flow of the communication, most often in real time (simultaneously).”

Care to take a peek into what an Educational Sign Language Interpreter does in the classroom? This video will give you a brief glimpse:

Don’t we sound so professional and exciting?

Most of the time, we maintain a professional demeanor and smoothly facilitate communication between parties with hardly a hiccup. However, there are challenges we face daily that I am fairly sure many other occupations never experience.

As an Educational Interpreter in the school setting, I translate spoken words into American Sign Language (ASL) for the Deaf/HH students. I also voice for them when they communicate in ASL. That’s what was happening between the student and music teacher in the scenario above.

The question was directed at the teacher but it was my voice that she heard representing the student. That can often have interesting results, to say the least.

The hearing world often doesn’t know what to do in the presence of a sign language interpreter.

I’ve had a presenter at a school assembly try to talk faster and faster to see if I could keep up. I became more entertaining for the audience than he was.

Another time, a clown on the stage kept bopping me on the head with his balloons to make the kids laugh. It goes without saying, that I was NOT laughing with them…

I’ve stood in front of a class interpreting a two-hour video during a class party while the teacher tried to hand me a root beer float and a plate of cookies and chips. (Did she not notice my hands were preoccupied?)

Students who don’t know a word in sign language have walked up to me – more times than I can count – flapping their hands all over and ask me, “What did I just sign?” (Um, nothing in any language I know…)

I simply adore the Deaf/HH students I interpret for.

They challenge me to improve my skills while at other times I wonder, “Why do I even bother?”

I was once interpreting a complicated algebra lesson and trying to focus on how I was going to set up a math equation with my hands when my Deaf student waved for my attention.

I paused in the middle of the interpretation and looked at him. He simply wanted to ask me what the little scar on my forehead was from. Really?! (By this time, the teacher was five miles ahead of me in the algebra lesson.)

Another time, a seventh grade Deaf student asked me to move a little to the left while I interpreted. I was feeling proud that she had advocated for better visual access to the interpreter. My pride quickly deflated when she signed to me, “You were blocking a cute guy across the room.”

When a student wanted to ask the teacher if she could use the restroom, she told me to voice it in a whisper so the “whole class wouldn’t know she was going to the bathroom”. Did she think I was planning to shout it out as a class announcement?

You have to have your emotions under control and nerves of steel for this job.

Don’t even get me started on trying to interpret the reading of Where the Red Fern Grows when every fifth grade student seated in front of me is bawling, including my Deaf student that I have to try to keep eye contact with. (Yes, of course, I cried with him – wouldn’t you?)

Or, when my eighth grade student asked the social studies teacher (who has long hair) if his hair was fake because it looked like he glued it on with a hot glue gun. (Remember – it’s my voice the teacher AND the whole class is hearing here, folks.)

I have been given the task of babysitting everyone’s hearing aids and cochlear devices (the outside portion of a surgically-implanted hearing device) while the students ran a lap in P.E. class and didn’t want sweat on their equipment.

School staff has run all over the school looking for lost cochlear devices (which contain a strong magnet) only to find them stuck on metal poles on the playground or on a metal desk leg in a classroom. Our preschoolers have even flushed their hearing aids down the toilet in protest against wearing them.

Imagine the horrors of being the only female in a room full of adolescent boys (including male instructors) in a sex education class as the body parts are named and every set of eyes shoot to the interpreter to see how that word is signed so they can show their buddies later.

The experience that will be told among my fellow interpreters for many years to come happened right before the local annual county fair. Two students had brought their show rabbits to class to share. We also had a class mascot dog (a large golden retriever) in the classroom. I was in front of the class interpreting a math lesson (why is it always during a math lesson for me?) the teacher was giving.

The teacher had given permission for the rabbits to run free around the room. (She was told they were both females.) While I interpreted, the rabbits decided to “get to know each other better” right under my feet. This agitated the dog, which began barking and snapping at the rabbits while dancing around my feet trying to get to them.

The teacher started yelling for the students to cage their rabbits immediately. She went on to diplomatically inform them that the female rabbit would probably now become a mother and be ineligible for showing at the fair. The students were all laughing hysterically while I stood unable to move until the rabbits were retrieved.

Of course, I couldn’t bow out gracefully. My Deaf student promptly began waving for my attention to ask me to explain why I had signed that one rabbit might become pregnant. (Don’t forget, I still had to sign everything being said during this drama regardless if I was an unwilling character in it!) I fumbled to sign an extremely vague answer for him as the teacher tried to restore order to her classroom. The math lesson was officially over.

You might be thinking, “Wow, good thing that kind of stuff doesn’t happen on an everyday basis.”

Actually, sometimes it does. Interpreters could fill volumes with stories of their experiences that would rival any encyclopedia set.

Some days I’m so exhausted, my back is screaming in protest, and my hands are so swollen that my fingers have trouble bending. Still, I love doing what I do and I rarely suffer from boredom. Besides, where else could I be physically and mentally challenged to my limit on a consistent basis while getting to hang out with the most expressive and fun-loving kids on the planet?

Excuse me while I go swallow some aspirin and soak my hands in an Epsom salt bath…

Meanwhile, here’s a link to learn about beginning your own career as an Educational Sign Language Interpreter:

classroominterpreting.org