Aotearoa / New Zealand

King was born Deaf and uses New Zealand Sign Language full-time, leading the primary school class using every tool in his kit that is not the spoken word.

“I can read your lips and when the children are talking to me I can read their lips, but I don’t speak myself, I don’t use my voice,” King explains through an interpreter.

To begin, King led the class from the front while an interpreter would stand at the back of the room speaking the words (the interpreter would also be around for staff meetings, parent/teacher interviews and seminars).

Gradually, King would ask the interpreter to “turn their voice off” in class – and over time, with plenty of preparation, planning and perseverance, their time in the classroom was wound back, until they did not need to be there at all.

“When I sign it has to go to the interpreter who then talks and it's quite a bit of time, whereas if we can sign together I can talk to you directly and so we can have that interaction and that builds a better relationship instead of having to go through another person,” King said.

“So last year … when the interpreter left, all of them [the students] were so happy to have the interpreters gone … and I actually took a picture and I will never forget that moment.

“I was so shocked … they were just … invested in having me as a teacher.”