Twelve students sit on the colorful rug, all eyes glued to Michelle Moock as she writes, “What does responsibility mean?” in large letters on an easel pad.
She gestures in American Sign Language as she reads the sentence slowly into a microphone linked to auditory trainers worn by each fifth- and sixth-grader in the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Program at Taft Elementary School in Santa Ana.
Moock’s eyes sweep the cluster of students as a forest of hands shoot into the air. One by one, the students share their answers. Moock repeats them in English and American Sign Language.
“Responsibility means to close things after you open them.”
“Responsibility means to help others.”
It’s an important lesson for the students, many of whom have only rudimentary communication at home with parents and siblings who don’t know sign language.
And it’s an important lesson Moock took to heart early in life.
Unlike her students, Moock can hear.
But two of her three sisters – the eldest and youngest – are deaf.
Her parents never treated any of the four girls differently – an example that inspired all of them to take on challenges and one Moock uses to inspire her students.
“There was no pity, ‘poor you, deaf child,’ thing, which I see a lot of,” Moock said.
In 1991, Moock’s eldest sister, Heidi Zimmer, became the first deaf woman to climb to the top of Mt. McKinley in Alaska. Zimmer has also climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro in Africa and Mt. Elbrus in Russia.
“She didn’t reach (Mt. McKinley’s peak) the first time because of altitude and weather conditions so she had to go back again,” Moock said. “She had to persevere.”
Moock shares that attitude with her students. When they first come into her classroom, students will say they can’t, or that things are too hard.
“I say, ‘I’m sorry but those words aren’t acceptable in my class. You have to try,’ ” Moock said. “You want to show a hearing person that you can, so you have to have confidence in yourself.”
Moock could inspire them with her own life.
She picked up American Sign Language without formal lessons, gleaning the language from interactions with her sisters. She learned it so well, and identified so deeply with the deaf community, that she often stumped her sister’s friends at the California School for the Deaf in Riverside.
“I would hang out with her friends and they’d ask me, ‘Are you hearing or are you deaf?’ I just became, really, a part of the deaf community,” Moock said.
After receiving her teaching credential at the University of Pacific, she attended Gallaudet University, which only accepts hearing graduate students for fields serving deaf and hard-of-hearing people.
At Gallaudet, she helped low-functioning deaf adults learn to purchase items in stores and ride city buses. She also coached cheerleading and taught high school English to deaf students, and worked with a deaf woman who was competing in a beauty pageant.
Moock joined Taft in 1984. She’s taught various grades in the deaf and hard-of-hearing program and spent two years teaching regular second grade. She also worked as an itinerant teacher helping deaf and hard-of-hearing students across Orange County.
Moock said her experiences gave her a keen knowledge of the trials deaf students face.
“Just because you want to teach the deaf you may not understand them,” Moock said. “But I understand.”
That’s why Moock brings her classroom to life, drawing on all the tools she can – serving students Chinese food so they can taste, smell, and experience Chinese New Year, teaching students to line dance to country music that blares so loudly from speakers loud that they can feel the beat.
“The exciting thing is when that light bulb goes on and they get it,” Moock said. “It’s exciting to see when you can find each child’s talent.”
Her colleagues say that’s Moock’s talent – finding each child’s strength through whatever means are necessary. Her students particularly enjoy the food she shares. Last month, she made Annie’s corn cakes during a reading of Jan Brett’s “Annie and the Wild Animals.”
“She makes the most delicious food,” student Hector Reyna, 10, signed.
Hector is happy to talk about his teacher to anyone who will listen.
“She should be famous because she helps us so much. She helps us learn and she prepares us,” Hector signed.
Moock said her students face unique challenges – starting at home, a lonely place for children who can’t share their triumphs and struggles with parents and siblings who don’t sign. The lack of shared language at home takes a steep toll.
Among Taft’s deaf and hard-of-hearing fifth- and sixth-graders, reading levels range from pre-kindergarten through second grade. Math levels range from second grade to fourth grade. The average reading level of a deaf student at high school graduation is fourth grade, Moock said.
“A Spanish-speaking child can go home and listen to the TV, listen to their cousins, listen to the radio; they’re getting language input that way,” Moock said.
“A profoundly deaf child goes home and is not getting language, so the brain is off,” she said. “The brain is not on until they come back to school.”
That’s why most of Moock’s students eagerly return to school each day, which deepens her commitment to the classroom.
Deaf students who feel isolated at home also gravitate away from family members who don’t learn to sign, and form surrogate families within the deaf community – Moock’s community.
And so she strives to build in them the skills and confidence they will need to cope with the challenges of middle school and beyond.
“For a deaf child, they have to learn to feel confident because the world out there is not nice,” Moock said.
Contact the writer: 714-796-7949 or firstname.lastname@example.org
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