This week I started my ASL App Store journey and found ASL Bloom as a top recommendation. The lessons on ASL Bloom are quick and easy and include great video and questions throughout to make sure you are understanding what is being taught. I love the length of the videos and the knowledge checks throughout. However, there are a couple down sides to this app. Firstly, after the 7 day free trial this app costs just under $100 a year! Depending on how long you plan to use the app or what your goals are this may be a decent number compared to an in person class. However, as someone who wants to learn just a few more signs here and there, $100 just seems like a bit too much. Secondly, this could be either a benefit or deterrent depending on the learner but the lesson plans are set out in stone as to which topic you learn each week. For someone wanting to learn the entire language this is great, but as someone who wants to add some signs in, it was fairly inconvenient that I wasn’t able to just click into topics that interested me.
This week I learned that many signs include the letter sign they begin with! Every letter that was taught on bloom was followed by a word that included the letter sign. This was great to associate the sign with not just the letter but with the word as well. Three signs that stand out in my mind are blue, emergency, and dinosaur! Below is a video of me showing first the letter signs for B, E and then D followed by the signs of the words!
I love that you are learning to sign. When I went to school out of highschool I got a certificate in signing in classrooms, its a great tool to have. The alphabet is the baseline for all signs, so its great that you have seen that connection.