The Silent Garden

Silent Garden Lecture

Supported by the Silent Garden Education Fund through a grant from the Laurence W. Levine Foundation and many other friends of the Silent Garden, the Silent Garden Lectures bring education and awareness to the Central Valley and beyond.

The lecture series began in 2013 as a way to foster opportunity, understanding and awareness for the Deaf and hard of hearing community. Through an endowment from The Silent Garden Education Fund, continued support for workshops and other outreach opportunities for alumni, friends, practitioners, educators and family members are made available.

13th Annual Silent Garden Lecture Series

Saturday, February 22, 2025 | 8 a.m. - 4 p.m. PST (Pacific Standard Time)

Virtual presentation on "58-In-Mind: Multilingual Teaching Strategies for Diverse Deaf Students" featuring keynote presentations by a team of selected researchers and P-12 teachers.

Register today!

Keynote Presentations

2025 Silent Garden Speakers

Hooking Them Into The Book

(Speakers: Debbie Golos, Marlon Kuntze, Kimberly Wolbers and Chris Kurz)

58-In-Mind: Mathematics Unlocked - Multilingual and Multimodal Strategies for Teaching Deaf Students

(Speakers: Chris Kurz, Brenda Call and Samantha Braidi) This presentation offers insights and practical strategies for teaching mathematics to Deaf students with diverse backgrounds. Emphasizing the value of tactile, spatial, and visual approaches, we highlight the importance of using multiple representations, fostering mathematical discussions, and integrating multilingual practices, including ASL and English. We also stress family involvement in promoting mathematical understanding and provide activities that engage students in meaningful ways. Through examples, we hope to inspire teachers to cultivate mathematical thinking and critical analysis in Deaf students.

58-In-Mind: Writing Instruction

(Speaker: Kimberly Wolbers and Sarah McGaughey) Writing instruction can be motivating for your students, effective, and fun! In this presentation we share motivating and research-based approaches to writing instruction that can be used with multilingual Deaf students across the grade span. We will introduce principles from a framework called Strategic and Interactive Writing Instruction (SIWI), which provides guidance for planning sign-multilingual instruction and making instructional decisions during writing. SIWI is built upon years of evidence-based research of what is effective writing instruction addressing the unique language needs of Deaf students.

58-In-Mind: Reading

(Speaker: Marlon Kuntze) In this presentation we share two assumptions about reading. Learning reading through eyes works, and it is driven by meaningful engagement with reading. Our claim is that communication that is rich, socially satisfying, and intellectually nourishing is key to the success of reading instruction. Deaf children will learn to read if reading is enjoyable, comprehensible, and cognitively engaging. Reading development is facilitated when students get support during the process of thinking about the content and responding to it. Dialogic reading is an example of giving students the scaffolded support that will help them experience what reading has in store for them.

58-In-Mind: Incorporating the Arts Across Curriculum

(Speakers: Fred Beam and Debbie Golos) In this presentation, we share motivating strategies for integrating the arts into content areas across the curriculum. We emphasize the importance of providing role models from diverse backgrounds and embedding opportunities for creative expression to engage, motivate and learn. Participants will learn ways to bring the arts into everything they do.

Interview of Gallaudet University Press Editors

(Speakers: Angela Leppig and Katie Lee, Moderator: Dr. Paul Ogden) The editors of Gallaudet University Press are to be congratulated for selecting the 58-in-Mind project for publication. We will start our interview by discussing their history and roles as editors at Gallaudet University Press and then will get their thoughts on their first look at the proposal to publish 58-in-Mind. Looking at this textbook, how did they come to the decision that it is the perfect book for teachers? We also will compare this textbook with others they have seen or reviewed to determine its uniqueness. We will be sure to learn the best way to order a copy of the textbook.

8:00 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. PST
Welcome remarks by Dr. Kara Zografos, dean of the College of Health and Human Services
Opening remarks by Dr. Paul W. Ogden, founder of The Silent Garden
Thank You Message to Julie Swaggert, National Emblem Club Leader

8:30 a.m. - 9:15 a.m. PST
Presentation 1: "Hooking them into the Book"
Debbie Golos, Marlon Kuntze, Kimberly Wolbers and Chris Kurz

9:15 a.m. - 9:30 a.m. PST
Break

9:30 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. PST
Presentation 2: "Mathematics Unlocked: Multilingual and Multimodal Strategies for Teaching Deaf Students"
Chris Kurz, Brenda Call and Samantha Braidi

10:30 a.m. - 10:45 a.m. PST
Break

10:45 a.m. - 11:45 a.m. PST
Presentation 3: "58-In-Mind Writing Instruction"
Kimberly Wolbers and Sarah McGaughey

11:45 a.m. - 12:45 p.m. PST
Break for Lunch

12:45 p.m. - 1:45 p.m. PST
Presentation 4: "Reading"
Marlon Kuntze

1:45 p.m. - 2 p.m. PST
Break

2:00 p.m. - 3:15 p.m. PST
Presentation 5: "58-In-Mind: Incorporating the Arts Across the Curriculum"
Fred Beam and Debbie Golos

3:15 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. PST
Break

3:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. PST
Interview of Gallaudet University Press Editors:
Angela Leppig and Katie Lee by Paul Ogden

4:00 p.m. – 4:15 p.m. PST
Closing Ceremony
Paul W. Ogden

Additional Information

Registration and CEUs

The Silent Garden Lecture is 100% free for all attendees
CEUs (0.5) available for $35 through RID, BEI and Fresno State

Accommodations

American Sign Language interpreting will be provided
ASL and English translations available
For best viewing experience, joining webinar from a desktop or laptop is recommended
For questions or accommodations, contact Dr. Paul Ogden at paulo@mail.fresnostate.edu