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Behaviour/development

Talk to others about child development and behaviour stages here. You can find more information on our development calendar.

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Original poster

Positive baby signing stories here please :-)!!

35 replies

bobsmum · 14/02/2007 17:59

I'm helping out at a friend's parenting class on Monday (hello if you're a MNetter and haven't let on )
As I've signed with both ds and ss she asked if I would come along and talk for 30-40 mins about communicating and signing with your child.

I've got a few ideas/songs etc, but would love to add in some great anecdotes from others too.

Like what age did your dc sign? What were their favourites/most commonly used signs? Did they go on to be confident talkers ( I think most signers do).

Any tips for chatting/communicating with your dcs generally. Or silly songs that went down well? That sort of thing

Please help me make this talk really worthwhile for mums who may never have heard of baby signing and might just need some extra encouragement to chat with their children.

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Original poster

bobsmum · 14/02/2007 18:02

That's ds and dd

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Weegle · 14/02/2007 18:16

I'm sure there will be much better stories out there but my DS is just over 8 months and we've been signing with him since birth (we do some anyway as I have a deaf nephew and I myself am partially deaf) and he just 10 days ago started signing Bottle. I think this is quite young and wonder if it's because we've used it consistently since early on. He confuses it also with drink though - so both bottle and drink are signed "bottle" by him, but hey, I know what he means! Good luck, hope it goes well.

wangle99 · 14/02/2007 18:27

I sighed with DS from when he was 5 months old, he first signed back at 10 months - signed 'hello' as daddy walked through the door. Most favoured signs were 'cat', 'dog', 'help' and 'milk' although his signing vocabularly was alot more.

When he was 15 months old, he fell over DH's foot and was crying, I looked at him and he was signing 'ouch/pain' and pointing to his foot. I felt very emotional that he was able to tell me accurately at that age where he was hurting.

He is now 3y3m and talks fluently in sentences with grammar almost 100% correct.

What is interesting is if he is with a younger child who doesn't speak he automatically reverts to signing with them, was stunned the first time he did this! (He does it regardless of whether the child signs tho!).

Hope that helps, signing is something I am passionate about - actually teach classes now I love it so much

hunkermunker · 14/02/2007 18:29

DS2 signed a couple of months ago - he does "milk", and that's about it, but we've not done as much with him as we did with DS1 (I went to baby signing with him and he signed milk, various animals, home, all sorts of things).

DS2 is 12mo and on Monday, he signed milk, pointed up and said "up". I said "Would you like to go and have some milk upstairs?" and he grinned and said "Iss!"

DeputyMacDawg · 14/02/2007 18:31

Hve you seen the Something Special website?
My dd loves to watch this show and tries to copy the signs.

Chandra · 14/02/2007 18:35

We did a bit of baby signing at home, never attended any classes but DS was signing milk, more, and even made up a sign for his comforter. And the day he signed back to me "don't touch" when I took one of his toys really melted my heart. He was signing from 8 - 9 m and now he is 4 years old, these signs come back when he is struggling to stress his point

fairysnuff · 14/02/2007 18:35

I am really interested in signing, but they don't do it in my area. I am going to give it a go myself and I tell anyone who will listen, what a great idea it is! My niece was/is fluent!!
When I mentioned to the midwives that they ought to arrange classes, they were interested and asked if I might be able to.
I would defo be interested but am not sure what is involved?
Wangle, could you give me some info? I will start another thread, so as not to hijack yours, bobsmum, but thought I might grab your attention when I saw you say that, wangle.

FrannyandZooey · 14/02/2007 18:36

Ds's first sign was "more", inspired by one of his first tastes of strawberries. I can still remember his little serious face and the look of concentration as he bent his fingers into the right shape

We taught him "milk", obviously, but also "flag" as there was a big flag near where we lived and he always liked to stop and look at it. There were a few occasions where we were out and about and he suddenly asked urgently for "milk". We would have to stop and find somewhere I could feed which was a bit of a pain. It took several weeks of it happening in the same place for me to realise that he was actually signing "flag" (they looked very similar the way we did them) and was probably wondering why the hell he kept getting fed

He was a late speaker but it didn't matter in the least because his non-verbal communication was superb. He made up several signs for things that were important to him (eg "music") and taught them to us. He is now a very fluent speaker with a scary, large vocabulary. I would do baby signing again in a flash, it was one of the best things we ever did.

Chandra · 14/02/2007 18:40

Fairysnuff, there is a very good book for baby signing by Joseph Garcia, you can also get the videos that go with it but are difficult to get in the UK.

I know a person who ended up being the sign with your baby teacher of the region, she didn't have any previous experience but looked at a couple of books when her baby was about 5m and took it from there.

ProfYaffle · 14/02/2007 18:43

We signed with dd and it was fabulously successful. She's generally not prone to tantrums and I'm convinced it's because she could communicate her needs from an early age. She's 2.10 now and still reverts to signs when she feels she's not being understood verbally. DD2 is due next weeks and we will definately sign with her.

wangle99 · 14/02/2007 18:45

Fairysnuff if you want to email me on sarah at bosleake dot com then please do

wangle99 · 14/02/2007 18:54

My sister is signing with her DS now, he's 16 months and has a vocab of 9 signs so far - favourites being 'dog' 'cat' and 'more' (so funny when the biscuit tin appeared at the weekend!).

They were visiting us at the weekend and he learnt 'cat' and 'where' whilst here with me

aviatrix · 14/02/2007 19:08

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Original poster

bobsmum · 14/02/2007 19:19

Wangle - do you teach signing through a franchise? I'd love to do it too - hopefully it could be pretty school/nursery hours friendly. I did classes with Sing and Sign but have also heard v good things about Tinytalk.

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Original poster

bobsmum · 14/02/2007 19:21

Aviatrix - I hope you're ignoring your HV He'll drop the signs when he's ready. It's the communication that's the important thing and you both understand each other which is what matters

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wangle99 · 14/02/2007 19:26

Bobsmum - I do teach through a franchise and it has been the best thing I have ever done. Totally school hour friendly and of course I'm home during ALL the school holidays!

If you are passionate about signing then look into it. I love it.

Oh, visited my sister weekend before last and taught nephew sign for aeroplane, was holding him in my arms and first time he did it his 'aeroplane' smacked me right in the face!!!

scorpio1 · 14/02/2007 19:54

my ds2 has speech problems and signs.he has mastered alot of signs, and if it wasnt for signing we would all be very frustrated.i did however have to teach (!) the nursery staff what the signs meant, but all is good now. ds2 is 2.4 yrs incase anyone wondered. we started doing it just after he was 1, and on the first go he did 'more' (a firm favourite!)my ds1 signs to him too,and signing has bought on his sound noises (ddd,mmm). so a big fat positive here!

im ttc dc3 at the moment and i will sign to the baby asap-i think its a great thing!

His favourite signs are 'more' 'banana' 'car' 'train' 'cat' 'mummy' 'daddy' 'drink' and 'eat/food', amongst others. to learn more signs myself i went to a course run by local sure start-it helped loads.

a big fat positive here!

fairysnuff · 14/02/2007 21:10

Does it normally take up to 9months before they sign back?
Books I have read (though I admit to not reading many yet...ok, one!!)
Anyway it said that they would pick up initial signs within 4-6 weeks! Was that nonsense?

Really good to hear that you know of someone who started with their DC at 5 months and went on to be region teacher, Chandra.
My DD is 5 months now and I think it is time to start doing my research

Have heard of Joseph Garcia books, they went for silly money on ebay a while back!
Is it better to teach BSL though?
I don't suppose it matters as long as you and DC understand one another?
I am not keen on the, obvious, sign I have seen for Breastmilk so far, haha. So think I may invent a few of my own?

aviatrix · 14/02/2007 21:47

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aviatrix · 14/02/2007 21:48

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fairysnuff · 14/02/2007 21:58

Oh yes, sorry thats what I should have said, it takes them to 9 months before they are able to communicate?
Yeah, that still sounds wrong But I know what I mean!

For a nice story and back to the threads real reason . My niece was able to comunicate with us fully the last time she visited (at about 18months, sorry I loose track of my dates!) She was able to do the basic food, drink etc, mummy and daddy. But it was the sign for her sister that we all liked! Her dad (my brother) had made it up that it was the thumb on the nose and fingers wiggling (like, Naaa!). It was funny to see her use it and an example of home made signs working just as well as proper BSL ones.
A real inspiration to me

Browny · 14/02/2007 22:01

Hi Wangle99, I haven't seen you around here for ages, hope you are all o.k. Did you get my e-mail I sent you ages ago? x

Browny · 14/02/2007 22:04

Oops, meant to say that I've posted quite a lot on other thread about baby signing. I used the Sing and Sign DVD's and taught my son using those alone. I loved teaching my ds2 to sign and am just sorry that I hadn't heard of it when my other three children were babies. It enabled my ds2 to tell me when he wanted milk, water, food, juice or even to tell me that he was tired and wanted to go to bed and he started signing to me when he was about 10/11 months old. I really miss him signing to me now because his speach is really good now, he is 2.5 and speaks clearly in little sentences! Go for it!

wangle99 · 15/02/2007 07:36

Browny - I did get your email and replied to it am guessing by that message you didn't receive it?

Original poster

bobsmum · 15/02/2007 10:08

Thanks everyone for your messages - these are all great examples.

FWIW my ds signed for drink at 7 months but I don't think he meant it - I think h e just copied, but by 9/10 months he had 5 or 6 signs and started talking at 12 months dropping the signs gradually.

Dd followed a similar pattern. Favourite sign was pig, most used signs were milk and more Both have a huge vocabulary now for their ages.

I found that signing made me slow my speech down just a little and be more likely to repeat a word, maybe making it a bit easier for them to pick up the words? Just a pet theory though

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