In Paris Convention organised in 1875 in Paris, ban of sign language was proposed. At the end of the Milan Convention organised between 6-11 September 1880 with the participation of 3 Audiologist and 3 deaf individuals, sign language in education was officially banned by accepting verbal education instead of sign language in the education of deaf individuals. In 1953, Turkish Sign Language was officially banned in Turkey and verbal – audial method in education was started. The reason for this ban expressed as the higher success rate in the verbal – audial method for deaf individuals and the argument was that education with sign language was ineffective.

At the end of 1970s, it was seen that this decision was incorrect around the world and education with sign language was adopted for the education of deaf individuals. Although the mistake has been corrected around the world, the ban on Turkish Sign Language education in deaf schools in Turkey continues and sign-language communication between deaf students was also prohibited.

On 01 July 2005, Article 15 of the Law on Disabled Individual No. 5378 accepted by the National Assembly and published on Gazette officially recognised Turkish Sign Language with “Turkish Sign Language System has been created by the Turkish Language association to ensure education and communication of the individuals with hearing impairment”.

After the recognition of Turkish Sign Language, Turkish Sign Language education was not introduced in the deaf schools and verbal – audial education method was still used in these schools.

Since 1953, deaf individuals in Turkey cannot have education in their primary communication language.

At this moment, Anlatan Eller has been established on 19 December 2016 as a social entrepreneurship to provide education to deaf individuals with Turkish Sign Language support to provide a solution to inequality of opportunities in education.

We have started our Turkish Sign Language supported education on 19 February 2017 by publishing our videos on YouTube. We have prepared individuals to KPSS for Disabled Individuals (EKPSS) on 22 April 2018 with class education in İstanbul with the collaboration of the Municipality of Şişli and with our class videos on social media.

We have achieved a 56% success increase at the high-school individual level and 45% success increase at university individual level in this exam.

We will prepare deaf individuals to General Talent Field (Turkish – Mathematics) of EKPSS that will be organised in April 2020 from Anlatan Eller Online Education Platform and class education in İstanbul.

For detailed information and collaboration: [email protected]