i-Sign: Sign Language Learning Application Via Gamification

Abstract

Hearing loss is a type of disability where people who suffer from it could not hear a sound or can only listen to a sound with certain levels. People with hearing loss use sign language to communicate with others and to help them in their learning process. For this study, an interview and survey were conducted with teachers and students from SK Pendidikan Khas Melaka and few problems have been identified in the learning spectrum of children with hearing disability. They face difficulties in learning due to the lack of exposure about the correct sign language since young, difficulty in interpreting sign language in the conventional teaching material due to the nature of its static image contents, and hearing loss children are also usually less focused in the learning process and are easily distracted by their surroundings when the class is in session. To solve these problems, i-Sign is developed as a learning application that incorporates simple gamification in its development that could help hearing loss children to learn the alphabet and basic words of sign language. The use of gamification and multimedia elements provide a more interactive and fun learning environment for the students instead of using static contents, and are also used to direct students’ attention to the learning activity making them more focused in the learning process. i-Sign was developed using the ADDIE model which includes the Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation phases. In the evaluation phase, a usability test was conducted on 8 children with hearing loss to test the acceptance of the user towards this application and 91.89% of the respondents found that the application meets their expectation of the application capability in terms of its effectiveness, efficiency and user satisfaction. This shows that gamification can be used as an alternative learning material for hearing loss children and help expose the correct sign language to them.  The application can also be used by the public that wants to learn about sign language.