2b. Sharing Interesting Facts - Whole-Part

1. Sharing Interesting
Facts: Whole-Part
Unit 19
ASL III

2. Sharing Interesting
Facts
People find themselves wanting to relay in
their daily conversations interesting or
amusing information they have heard about or
read.
Interesting facts is the topic of this unit
because these facts can be surprising,
unbelievable, educational, and fun - the
makings of an interesting conversation.

3. Sharing Interesting
Facts
This unit is designed to help you develop good interpretations
of written information. Specific grammar structures are
introduced to help you organize the essential information to
show the relevance of the information presented.
Because of the concise nature of each fact, you need to learn how to analyze
the fact to understand what it means. When presenting the fact, you may
have to explain, rephrase, demonstrate, or draw conclusions to convey the
fact accurately. This lesson will help you be better able to interpret written
information into ASL without the interpretation being unduly influenced
by English structure. We selected facts that fit into four categories: whole-
part, listing, comparisons, and illustrating a fact.

4. Translating Facts
The facts we will learn about are organized into four
categories:
● Whole-Part
● Listing
● Comparisons
● Illustrating a Fact
Each category has a particular grammatical structure. Later,
you will use these structures when preparing your own facts to
share.

5. Whole-Part
▪ Facts that contain phrases such as “one out
of” and “half of all” fall under the Whole-
Part category.
▪ Since the fact is essentially about the part, it
must be distinguished from the whole to
make the point.
▪ Use the following
structure to present
whole-part facts.

6. Whole-Part: Translation
Guide
1. Set up the whole (use raised eyebrows).
2. Tell about the part using either
percentages, fractions, or ratio.
3. Contrast the part with
the rest of the whole
and comment.

7. Fact 1: Fractions
Video Notes:
Since women constitutes the whole,
it is established first, followed by the
fraction ¼ to indicate the number of
women addicted to chocolate. John
further contrasts the part by saying
the remaining ¾ of women are not
addicted to chocolate. John raises his
eyebrows to emphasize the
numbers, followed by a slight pause
before commenting on the fact. The
manner in which you emphasize the
number tells the listener that this is
a rather large number or a
surprisingly small number.
Click on the video to watch it. It will open in a
new window.
John states the fact that “1 out of 4 women is
addicted to chocolate.”
Rehearse this segment - use raised eyebrows
when telling about the whole. Also, don’t
forget to raise your eyebrows to emphasize the
numbers, followed by a slight pause before
commenting on the fact.

8. Fact 1: Fractions
When the fraction is ¼, ½,
and up to 8/9, the palm
of the hand faces the
signer.
When the denominator is
10 or larger like 1/10,
3/16, 7/20, etc., the palm
of the hand for the
numerator 1-9 faces the
listener.
There is debate and variation among Deaf signers on exactly
how to sign fractions (which way the palm faces). In this
video, he explains that he prefers to sign fractions with the
palm facing whichever way is easier and “flows” best per
fraction. He also always signs both the numerator and
denominator with the same palm orientation for each
fraction. He signs numerators 1-5 with palm facing in, 6-9
palm facing out, 10 palm facing in again, and 11-up palm
facing out again.
Practice along with the video, so that you can get the feel for
how it “flows” more easily in the way explained above.

9. Fact 1: Fractions
Watch and then try translating
these additional sentences:
1. “2 out of 5 men wear
eyeglasses.”
2. “3 out of 10 women have
shoulder-length hair.”
Remember to convert the
numbers to fractions before
signing the fact.

10. Fact 1: Ratio
Video Notes:
To use ratio, John first identifies the
whole “of all the women in the
world,” then sets up a hypothetical
group (giving a number) to
represent the whole, “4 women” on
his left (weak) side. Then after
telling how many in this
hypothetical group, John shows “1
woman” out of the group toward his
right (dominant) side and makes the
comment “is addicted to chocolate.”
This construction requires the use of
a conditional clause, which makes it
more complicated to follow and use.
John translates the same fact that “1 out of
4 women is addicted to chocolate,” this
time using ratio.
Rehearse this segment - use raised
eyebrows when telling about the whole.
Also, don’t forget to raise your eyebrows to
emphasize the numbers, followed by a
slight pause before commenting on the fact.

11. Fact 1: Ratio
Ratio is used when the
signer doesn’t have time
or doesn’t know how to
convert the data to
percentages or fractions.
Here’s some examples of
using basic ratios - “1
out of 4”, “2 out of 5”,
and “5 out of 7”.

12. Fact 2: Percentage
Video Notes:
Stefanie begins with the whole “of all the
books people buy,” followed by the part,
“80% are paperbacks.” She contrasts this
part by mentioning that the remaining
books sold (20%) are hard covers. She uses
contrastive structure to tell the part from
the remainder. She emphasizes the
numbers (80% and 20%) to help make the
point. Stefanie ends by commenting on
people’s obvious preference for paperbacks.
Stefanie translates “books sold” by
discussing the idea in terms of the number
of books bought. By doing this, she focuses
our attention on kind of books that the
buyers chose, rather than emphasizing the
kind of books the sellers chose to sell,
which would have a different meaning than
the one intended.
Stefanie states the fact that “8 out of every 10
books sold are paperback.”
Rehearse this segment using percentages.
Remember to raise your eyebrows to set up
the whole topic, use contrastive structure,
and emphasize the number to help to make
the point.

13. Fact 2: Percentage
For percentages,
we sign a number
followed by this
sign.

14. Fact 2: Ratio
Video Notes:
Stefanie begins with the
whole “of all the books
people buy,” followed by a
hypothetical number, “for
every 10 books that people
buy,” and then states how
many of these books (8) are
paperbacks. Stefanie points
to the number on her hand
to emphasize the number 8.
Stefanie translates the same fact that
“8 out of every 10 books sold are
paperback” by using a ratio.
Rehearse this segment using this
emphasizing technique.

15. Review
Throughout this presentation, you have
learned the following:
1. Translating Facts: Whole-Part
a. Fractions
b. Ratio
c. Percentages