Free ASL Computer Technology Resources?

AceCaseOR asks: "I work in the computer lab at a community college. In the past I've worked with students who are deaf or mute, and, as I didn't know American Sign Language, I've had to resort to using pen and paper, with occasional gesture. As right now my mother is learning American Sign language, I'm learning some myself. I'm looking for free resources on computer terminology for American Sign Language. Any assistance that can be offered would be appreciated."

I know some

[numbski]

I began learning ASL many years ago in church. I haven't looked online, so I can't help you there, but I can give you some basic pointers.

DO NOT learn the alphabet in order. Learn by hand shapes instead. I made this mistake. If you learn them in order, your fingerspelling will suffer horrendously, and this is a big, big deal doing tech work, as there are no signs (at least last I used it) for most technical jargon, so you'll be relying on fingerspelling often.

What I mean by this is for example the letters A, T, N, M, and S. I typed them in that order due to hand-shape. E and O have similar shapings, as do R and Q.

Another is the cardinal sin of those learning ASL: NEVER sign 'is', as in the letter I, held to your mouth and then move it away. That's sign-english, and will drive bonkers a deaf person who speak ASL. :P I should know, I had enough people teaching me that went nuts.

Now, for a little side-story:

There was a girl that I liked, A LOT, when I was in high school. She was very cute, and her mother was deaf, so she and her mother helped teach the class.

One of the exercises was to sign "Hello, my name is ___, I am happy to meet you."

The sign goes as thus:

Hello (wave hello)
my (right hand placed against chest)
name (letter N draped over opposite arm)
(fingerspell your name here)
-----
I (point to yourself)
happy (open hand, pat chest)
meet (more on this in a moment)
you (point to the person you're speaking to)

Now, above you'll notice I didn't define "meet". Well, I was bad the previous week, and didn't attend, so I read up in a book how to do the signs, and of course I paired up with cute girl in question.

The problem with the drawing in the book is that they weren't that great. What I saw for "meet" was the sign for the letter K on both hands, and draw them together. The letter K is pointer and middle fingers pointed out, the rest of your fingers bent, and your thumb pointed forward, resting naturally between the pointer and middle fingers.

Well, the mother of this girl was standing there, and about the time I signed "meet", her eyes went wide and looked wild and almost angry.

"What??? What did I do wrong??" She and her daughter started dying laughing....

They finally explained that people usually "meet" standing up.

Those weren't letter K's, they were supposed to be representative of people...