Great Books in Sign Language

By Meg McCaffrey -- School Library Journal, 12/1/2004

For more than 50 years, Weston Woods, a pioneer in the field of children's filmmaking, has produced audiovisual adaptations of the best in children's picture books. Now, many of those classics—including Strega Nona by Tomie de Paola and Corduroy by Dan Freeman—are available in DVD versions enhanced with sign language narration (aasdpta.741.com).

The product is the brainchild of Harley Hamilton, a technology specialist and teacher at the Atlanta School for the Deaf and the recipient of the American Library Association's 2004 Grolier Award for outstanding contributions to the profession (September 2004, "The Missing Link," pp. 48–49). Hamilton has created a slew of learning tools for the hearing impaired. Weston Woods has long produced its films with closed-captioning. But young deaf children may not yet have the reading skills to follow along with captions. So, Hamilton approached Weston Woods, now a division of Scholastic, about integrating sign language into its works. The company jumped at the idea. "It's a greatly needed product," says Linda Lee, vice president and general manager of Weston Woods. Hamilton took existing films and added narrators—teachers from the Atlanta School sign the dialogue and explain the action right alongside the film's characters, thanks to the technology known as green screen. The new films are available in both home and school/library editions. Prices range from $14.99 to $59.99.