Education of deaf students in Spain: legal and educational politics developments.
This article examines the legal instruments and educational politics affecting deaf persons' educational rights in Spain. We present a historical view of deaf education in Spain before and after the Congress of Milan (1880) and then introduce educational legislation and practices in recent decades. At present, Spanish legislation is moving toward recognition of sign languages and the suitability of bilingual education for deaf students at all educational levels. This is a consequence of taking into account the low academic achievement of two generations of deaf students educated in a monolingual model. Bilingual projects are now run throughout Spain. We emphasize that efforts must be made in the legal sphere to regulate the way in which professionals who know sign language and Deaf culture-teachers, interpreters, deaf adult models-are incorporated in bilingual deaf schools.
Departament de Psicologia Evolutiva i de l'Educació, Facultat de Psicología, University of Barcelona, España. pfernandez@ub.edu
María del Pilar
Mdel P
Fernández-Viader
Mariana
M
Fuentes
D000328:Adult; D001290:Attitude; D060345:Education of Persons with Hearing Disabilities; D004519:Education, Special / Q000266:history* / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D049669:History, 16th Century; D049670:History, 17th Century; D049671:History, 18th Century; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D049674:History, 21st Century; D006801:Humans; D019303:Multilingualism; D019986:Persons with Hearing Disabilities / Q000266:history* / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D011057:Politics; D012574:Schools / Q000266:history / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000592:standards; D012813:Sign Language; D013030:Spain