Communicating with deaf and hard of hearing athletes

Just a thought that I would share this with you on how deaf and hard of hearing athletes perform in competition, and communicating with me.

In my 7 years of athletic training, I have been working with all hearing athletes and coaches. When I am with the deaf athletes, and I have to remind myself to use sign language or talk slowly, I just keep forgetting that they are deaf. Like an example, when I evaluate an athlete's knee, I would talk normal and they didnt understand me so I went like oops I put down the knee and sign it to them so they would understand me.

During a soccer match, there are 8 staff with red flag, 2 on each side (I took a picture of one of them standing up waving the red flag, it is when a referee blows the whistle and everyone stand up and wave the red flag. Also, the referee himself/herself also have bright yellow/orange flag so that would get everyone's attention.

I went to the track meet last night and watched men and women's 100 m sprint, I learned that each lane/block has three lights in front of the block (Red-get in the block, Yellow-get set, Green-GO), I also took a picture of it on the flicker.

Also, I was watching Tae Kwon Do, there are red flashing lights on each corner, and it will flash whenever a judge blows the whistle.

I hope to watch other sports and see how athletes reacts to timer, and referee making calls. In general, most of the referees and staff make universal sign language which we would understand in some way.


Also, I forgot to add on the opening ceremony notes, Jet Li the actor was there to read the prayer on "Power in me" and the President of Republic China was there as well, but he got up to the podium and signed "Let the games begin!" so he declared the Deaflympics games to beging, it was such a honor to be there and watch President of China there.


Tomorrow, we are playing against Russa in the quarterfinal, Russia is a very good, physical team.