Baby sign language

[beansprout]

Have heard all sorts of things about how this can help development and non-verbal communication.

I know a fair bit of BSL anyway so am intrigued and would be interested in using it with db (once s/he is born!),

Anyone else have experience of this?

Hi Beansprout!

I did baby signing with ds and it was a great help with communication - he picked it up really quickly and seemed to enjoy it.

Karen99 and Maomao are using it too and I'm sure there are others. We had a recent discussion on the different stuff available and ways of learning signing. I'll see if I can find it cos there were some good links. Back soon!

There's a thread here which might help.

Ask away if you've got any questions btw!

Hi beansprout, here's another thread

If you know a lot of BSL already, then you're ahead of the game! I will show my dd (13 months) a sign (we do a mix of makaton, BSL and ASL I guess), and she will usually modify it to show me what she's able to do. It's helped us immensely, and I've been surprised at how expressive she's been at such a young age.

I actually really started in earnest after talking to Davros about the effect Makaton was having on her autistic son.

Ooo I forgot to congratulate you on the little one! When are you due?

Hi there beansprout.

Just thought I'd add my encouragements. I used signing with my son, now 26 mths, and it was a definite bonus. Other mums at playgroups were very impressed that he could tell me when he was hungry, thirsty etc. rather than just having to cry and expect me to work out what it was! I'm sure it reduced frustration on his part that he could actually communicate with me (not that we missed out on toddler tantrums altogether)! Plus he's a real chatterbox now.

Best of luck

Sam

I signed with my dd, didn't go to classes, just got a book called Baby Signs from the library, after she started it (by sniffing loudly to "say" the word flower). It greatly helped us communicate and also seemed to really help her with learning 2 languages, as one sign would represent the same word in each language, IYSWIM.

Message withdrawn

We're doing it. Although ds cant yet really do signs (but flexes his fingers etc now eg trying to do the sign for milk), he understands several. He gets all excited now if you do the sign for 'hug'.And because its done to song at the classes, he loves it.

I sign with Lottie. It was introduced to us because she has Down's syndrime but will use it with any furture children.

It's wonderful. She was able to sign from a very early age that she wanted a drink and at 2 uses about 20-30 signs.

Please just make sure that whatever you sign you say as well.

I think it's a wonderful bridge to the spoken world.

Aw thanks everyone, this is all really positive and encouraging, that's great.

Am due in October and my understanding is that using signs would start at about 6 months or so. Does that sound about right?

Hooray, an October baby!!!

Yes, I think that my dd began to understand signs around then, and started roughly doing things like milk at about 7 months. However, I'm so uncoordinated that I started signing right from birth so that I'd have 6 months to do them correctly!

You can start using them with your baby at around that time. They'll start soaking up the information like the little sponges they are and they might start signing back from as young as 9 mths. The time to expect a sign though can be any time between about 10-14 months.

Ds still uses a few signs even now if he wants to really emphasise something, but he dropped the signs really quickly once he started talking from 12 mths.

Whatever you do - remember to enjoy it - you're not "teaching" signs - just adding simple gestures to you normal speech.

Yeah 6 months is about right but you start with them straight away.
Which signing are you using?

Start with really getting he feel and using 2 -4 signs. Then when they come naturally learn and start using another 2 -4. This way you'll build up your vocab slowly and surely rather than blind yourself with it.

I was out with D the other week and I said 'Do you want a drink?' and did the sign to him!!!!!!!!

I also adapted a few to suit me. I found drink for example was too similar to eat, both are signs that take the hand to the mouth. A 6 month old isn't going to be exact and I didn't know if L was asking for food or a drink so I changed drink sign to the sign for milk and then shortned that as well so it was done with 1 hand as i always hand her or something in the ohter hand!!

The first 2 I learnt and taught were drink and sleep/bed. then it was food and nappy, and so on.

We taught our 3 children to sign from about the age of 6 months. They all used it until they could communicate well verbally. (18 months for ds1; 17 months for dd1; 19 months for ds2) Dh and I were surprised to be told by a speech therapist that it was likely to delay our ds2 (then 13 months old)'s language development. (Why this professional felt obliged to offer her unsolicited opinion is beyond me as we were at a birthday party for a mutual friend's two year old at the time.) After careful consideration and some further internet surfing we decided to continue down the baby-sign-language path as he already knew the (american sign language) signs for more, milk, all done, eat, and help me. He spoke in beautiful sentences at 19 months and started to sign less frequently as his verbal skills were rewarded with adults understanding him. The cute thing is that now that he is nearly 2 1/2, he signs only if he is very tired or really upset and feeling misunderstood (talking all the while)!
We found it a life-saver with number 3 when he would scream from his high-chair and his brother and sister would run around trying to help him when we didn't know what he wanted. As soon as he had the ability to sign a few basic words (between 11-12 months) the screaming ended.

People often speculate that signing will delay talking, but as far as I can tell, research shows the opposite. So if a speech therapist tells you that again, open your eyes wide and say "How fascinating! That must be really new research, since all the old studies show a slight speedup. Where did you see that research?" Since undoubtedly they made it up on the spot, they are unlikely to have a good answer to this question and will just bluster. The linguists I know who specialize in child language development love the idea of teaching children to sign; they love anything that exposes children to more languages used for communication. Even if it did slow down spoken language, developmental linguists would still be all for it (bilingual children are slower to acheive full competence, but when they do, they get language learning advantages forever, for instance).

Love that approach californiagirl, must remember it next time a 'specialist' tells me something which is purely their opinion and not backed up by research at all.

Sam

Hi mums if you are interested in baby signing check out TinyTalk they run fantastic classes all over the country. The classes are for 1 hour, 1/2 hr of signing & singing then 1/2 hr of playtime for the babies & time to socialise over a cup of tea & a chocolate biscuit for the mums. What more could you want! The classes welcome babies from birth & the classes are flexable so you don't have to book or pre-pay.
They have also got a great Video/DVD which contains 150 signs which compliments the signing pack & CD. Check out their website at www.tinytalk.co.uk

Methinks this smacks of advertising....?

I know that this thread has gone cold, but was so outraged by what speech therapists seem to have told you about signing delaying language that I had to come in. In brief, they are speaking bollocks-ALL research shows a definite correlation between using signs and improved speech/language development. BTW I am a speech and language therapist, and would love to meet these people who have bought shame to our profession and wring their necks!

One of the commercial packages I have seen and been VERY impressed by is 'Sing & Sign'. There is a video which is excellent and the developer Sasha Felix runs classes in/around Brighton.
This is no advertisement, I have nothing to gain from this recommendation but know how beneficial baby signing is, and this woman is an inspiration and delight. (She has a website, www.singand sign.com I think...)

I love the signing board books for babies. DD started to pick it up at about 13 months and can now say dog, monkey, frog, flower, cat, hat, telephone, pig, more, hot, cold, sleepy and a few more I can't remember off hand. I'm so proud! I've also heard that it promotes communication rather than delaying speech.