Signing - a bit old hat now but would like some info

[tallmummy]

My ds4 aged 8 months has recently been diagnosed with hypotonia and developmental delay. He makes great eye contact but barely a sound. His hearing is ok. I thought I might try some makaton with him to help him communicate a little more. Still quite young I know but I thought if I start now it would become familiar to him. Where is the best place to start? Love to hear of others' experiences with makaton or hypotonia and GDD

Makaton have introduced a baby signing class might be worth looking into. As well as something special (the website is good as well) there's the Makaton Dave video that is fab. (It's called makaton nursery rhymes of something- it's on amazon).

Thanks bethron - thats encouraging. Will give it a go. I used to do a bit when I was teaching can only remember milk and biscuit at the mo!

I shall look out for those dvds getbackinyoujimjams - ta!

Is something special the one with mr tumbles on cbeebies?

Have just looked at the sing and sign website. There is a class near me. Waiting to hear from the organiser.

yep- mr tumble.

The only thing with sing and sign is that they don't use Makaton (although whatever they use is very similar I think) so it might be worth asking the organiser how it differs- and perhaps trying to use the Makaton signs instead. I don't know how severe your son's developmental delay is, but if he attends a SN nursery they will use Makaton there.

Brilliant that you're going to have a go tallmummy.
The earlier you start,the better!
(I'm a salt btw.)

Oh and I should say go for it. I didn;t bother signing with ds2 despite knowing that he was high risk for a speech and language disorder because I couldn't face it (had therapy coming out of my ears with ds1 and just wanted to enjoy ds2) anyway- ds2 did have some speech problems and I ended up wishing I had done it.

I've been signing with ds3 from about 10 months - and he is now producing signs (mainly "more" when he sees a biscuit :o) so pleased I did it. If he has a speech/language disorder at least we've started on signing.

the earlier the better.... but you gotta be patience as it will takes a couple of weeks before he start signing back 2 you

i sign Bsl anyway and also teaching my DD (17m) bsl and baby signs too.. its a great communication between all of us

There's another signing class company you might want to look into as well - \link{http://www.tinytalk.co.uk\Tiny Talk}
I go to classes with my dd and she loves it - half an hour of singing whilst signing the improtant words, then half an hour of playtime (for dd)and coffee and biscuits (for ME!!! )
8 months seems to be a good time to start learning although apparently it does take a while before most babies actually start to sign back to you. Dd has just started to sign milk, although I wanted to see how we were doing and found that if I signed before saying the word, she understood what I was "talking" about a good week or two before she actually signed the word herself!
Our teacher has said that we shouldn't expect dd to sign before she could wave and clap though, and I have found that the signing has coincided with dd starting to wave.

Thanks for the link Jennywren. The nearest group is a little too far away but I will check now and again for a more local group.