Serious and Adventure Video Games as Tools in the Deaf Education of Children

Abstract

Deaf education is characterized by specific challenges and needs. Studies showed, that deaf and hard-of-hearing children experience special difficulties in two fields – in learning a national verbal language, and in problem-solving. At the same time, video games are popularized in schools. However, in the education of deaf children, the use of games is hampered by accessibility issues. The main purpose of this master’s thesis will be to verify whether video games could prove to be a proper additional method of teaching in the case of deaf and hard-of hearing children, and what features should an educational video game have to meet the availability conditions. The research will be done on both serious and adventure games and will show which genre works better for developing which skills. Particular attention will be given to design guidelines for deaf-accessible games. Two research methods will be used for the purposes of this work. Qualitative research and discourse analysis of games. The qualitative research will consist of an open-ended questions survey among English-speaking and Polish-speaking teachers who work with deaf children, in order to get to know their attitudes towards games, main obstacles, and needs. The discourse analysis will be focused on two serious games, Prodigy and Wordwall, and on one adventure ASL-accessible game Deafverse. Based on the research, it will be explored, how, through using video games, modern education can meet the challenges of young deaf students and make learning more absorbing and effective.