Helping verbally-frustrated 13 mo - any ideas?

[HolidaysQueen]

My DS is just 13mo and is doing pretty well with his language. He uses several sounds/words (e.g. daddy, plane, ball and cat) in context more often that not, although never mummy , talks in gibberish 'sentences' with clear questioning sounds, and practises different sounds a lot. I think he's doing great and am a proud mummy

But he just seems to be getting increasingly frustrated when he can't get across what he wants or needs. The past couple of weeks, he seems to have spent a lot of time lying face down on the floor having mini tantrums at the moment, and it is invariably when he has been gesticulating and chattering but we just don't know what he is trying to say or ask for. Is it too late to try baby-signing, should we just sit it out and hope he has some kind of language explosion soon, or is there anything else we can do to help him?

Its definitely not too late to do signing - to be honest I started with ds's at about 6months but that was really for me to learn the signs not them, both only started using them at about your ds's age, give it a go I've found it fantastic, my mum was really about it but loves the fact she can 'talk' to ds2 who's 16months. He can tell us when he's hungry, thirsty, tired and understands other signs like nappy change and bath so I think he understands whats happening which cuts down on tantrums.

Loads of signing stuff on net - we did sing and sign classes (your ds is not to old to join in as they run all the way up to toddler) ds1 is 3 and still likes signing (and does it to his brother which is really cute)
Also try and watch Something Special on cbeebies and you can learn new signs from that too

good luck x

13mo is a great age to learn signs, we did it with both our dds. Didn't go to classes though, just bought a book from the NCT.

Yes, we did signing with ds at around this age. He wasn't really interested before, but it REALLY helped. Especially the key ones for basic needs like hungry, thirsty, tired, more, milk, yuk, etc.

Thanks all. Looks like we should give signing a go!

This is the book we used.

MAKATON you need to teah him this. it is really easy to use and it will help him a great deal. he is not too young at all as he is at the coppying stage of his development. AS a childminder i can strongly recommend makaton it is easier than sign language