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THIS PAGEA Parent's Guide to Hearing Loss
Produced by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Program
Manually Coded English
Manually Coded English (MCE) is made up of signs that are a visual code for spoken English. You may have heard of Morse code. Morse code is a system of dots and dashes that can be tapped out to form English words and phrases. MCE is a code for a language — the English language. Many of the signs (hand shapes and hand motions) in MCE are borrowed from American Sign Language (ASL). But unlike ASL, the grammar, word order, and sentence structure of MCE are similar to the English language.
Parents who are not familiar with MCE can take classes. Like all building blocks, you can start teaching MCE to your child even when he or she is an infant. Also, experts in MCE can work with you and your baby to help learn MCE.
Children and adults can use many other building blocks along with MCE. One building block that is commonly used is finger spelling, which is used to spell out words that don't have a sign in MCE — such as names of people and places.
Glossary
American Sign Language (ASL): ASL is a visual language. It is a complete language. It is much more than making gestures or "pictures in the air." ASL has its own vocabulary and grammar that is different from English. Signs and sentences in ASL are made using handshapes (for example, a pointing handshape, or the fingers spread out to show the number 5), moving the hands and arms (for example, in a straight line, or bouncing), and different facial expressions (for example, frowning or raising your eyebrows). You can share feelings, abstract ideas, and make jokes using ASL. You can take ASL classes and start teaching your baby even while you are still learning it yourself.
Building Block(s): "Building Blocks" refers to the different skills that parents can use to help their child learn language. There are many types of building blocks, and a family can pick and choose the building block (or blocks) that work best for their child and family. The following is a list of many commonly used building blocks.
Finger Spelling: Finger spelling is a building block that uses hands and fingers to spell out words. Hand shapes stand for the letters in the alphabet. Finger spelling is used with many other building blocks; it is almost never used by itself.
For more information or to order additional copies of "A Parent's Guide to Hearing Loss" visit CDC's website at www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/ehdi.