Woodland students learn to recite pledge in American Sign Language

WOODLAND — Woodland High School sophomore Jaylee Graham created a video to teach fourth-graders at Columbia Elementary School how to sign the school’s Woodland Way pledge using American Sign Language, also known as ASL. “I wanted to make the pledge even more meaningful,” teacher Carey Hanson said in a news release. Hanson reached out to the school’s ASL teacher, Kim Novak, who helped Graham record the video. Graham decided to take ASL at the high school because the father of one of her brother’s friends is deaf. “I had always wanted to find some way to talk to him and now I can,” she said. “Another reason I wanted to learn sign language is that it’s a very fascinating language.” With Columbia Elementary School home to the district’s Dual Language Immersion program, Hanson hopes to teach the Pledge of Allegiance in Spanish.