Welcome to  WeCue.net!  WeCue.net is what is known of as a Contributor’s Blog.  There will be many different bloggers who contribute on a regular basis.  The purpose of this blog is to share information and ideas concerning Cued Speech.  The contributors here are a mix of individuals who for personal or professional reasons have embraced Cued Speech.  If you’ve just stumbled upon this website by accident you may not have heard of Cued Speech before. 

Cued Speech is a mode of communication based on the phonemes and properties of traditionally spoken languages. Cueing allows users who are deaf or hard of hearing or who have language/communication disorders to access the basic, fundamental properties of spoken languages through the use of vision.  Despite the name, it has very little to do with articulation or speech per se. Cued Speech is a system consisting of one hand synchronized with the natural mouth movements of spoken language. Cued Speech is a visual system which allows a deaf person to differentiate the phonemes of a language which may otherwise be ambiguous with lip reading alone. In English, the 42 phonemes (/s/, /b/, /ch/, /e/, /r/, /n/, etc.) that combine to form over 600,000 words are represented with 8 hand shapes (consonants) and 5 placements around the face (vowels). Click to see the National Cued Speech Association’s Cue Charts. Speaking each of these sounds requires a distinctive shape of the lips and mouth.  A deaf child receiving the cues consistently learns to distinguish phonemes visually – in the same way that a hearing child does it auditorily – and is able to steadily and naturally acquire language. 

Since Cued Speech is based on phonemes, which make up all spoken languages, it is not language-specific and can be adapted for use in virtually any spoken language. To date, Cued Speech has been adapted for use with close to 60 different languages. Cued Speech provides clear and unambiguous access to the complete language necessary for comprehension, fluency and literacy. Cued Speech was designed to give deaf/heard of hearing children the tools to naturally acquire phonemic decoding skills at the same rate as their hearing peers. Research has shown that profoundly deaf children who consistently receive cued language read on the same level as their hearing peers. This is a truly amazing break-through. Cued Speech allows families to continue to use the language of the home. Research has shown that access to the language of the home is critical to the child’s age-appropriate development of complete language. The child can be a part of daily language interaction with the immediate and extended family, enabling expanded opportunities for language growth as well as increased security and sense of belonging. Parents and grandparents already have the language to convey their thoughts, ideas, and beliefs. Cued Speech gives them a simple tool to make these ideas accessible for the deaf or hard of hearing child. The child can have access to the same language used by siblings, neighborhood children and school friends.

I hope you’ll continue to read our blog and come back to post your questions and comments to the bloggers.  We Cue! and we want you to understand why We Cue! 

Barb