I am so thankful for my dear friend who had a baby girl when our firstborn came along. I was able to watch my friend do something with her baby that I would never have believed if I hadn't witnessed it first-hand. Whenever her daughter wanted something she would use sign language to say "please", and upon receiving the item, she would sign "thank-you". When she was hungry, she would sign "eat", and when she was thirsty, you guessed it, she would sign "water" or "cup" or even "milk". I was amazed, and completely sold on the idea of teaching our child to sign.
So we worked hard to learn and sign just the few basics that I had seen my friend teach her daughter. There wasn't much to see for a few months, except a couple of crazy, sleep-deprived parents waving their hands at their 8 month old. But, somewhere around 10-11 months, our baby started communicating to us with signs. No, they didn't look exactly like the "real" signs, but you could tell that she was adapting them to her dexterity level. We were so proud of our little girl, and I admit that we did enjoy showing-off her dazzling intellect to all who were willing to see her in action.
We quickly saw that learning to sign was much more than just a great parlor trick. Our little one-year-old was able to tell us what she wanted, without crying and getting frustrated. She was peaceful for the majority of the time, because she wasn't limited by her body's development in being able to speak. Babies learn and understand language far quicker than they are able to physically speak the language. (I equate it to having one year of high school Spanish and then being dropped off in the middle of Central America without an interpreter. You might be able to get the gist of what people around your are saying or asking of you, but to actually generate intelligible sentences is a much greater effort, if possible at all.) I believe that a good amount of frustration and temper tantrums in the toddler years are related to not having the tools to communicate what they need, want, or feel.
Then our first-born really surprised us when she started making up signs of her own, beyond the ones that we had taught her. They weren't American Sign Language, they were "Emma" language. Many games of charades were played in order to discover the meaning of some new sign, and she would belly giggle when we finally got it right. Her language development was exploding exponentially, and so was her comprehension, as many do during this stage, but the sign language was a tool that sped this process along.
So naturally, we taught the next two babies to sign as well. And things went just as smoothly. But, when the fourth baby was born, sign language with babies had become a new trend, and I found an exciting new resource at the library. We discovered Signing Time and immediately we lined up the grand parents to get us all the volumes (12) available at that time. What a wonderful investment! Talk about effortless sign language learning for everyone in the family. I learned many new useful signs. Signs like, "quiet", "sit", "pay attention", and other lovely things to command your child to do in a public place without yelling at them, or embarrassing them in front of others. (They are PERFECT signs for church services!) :)
But this time around, the signs did more than just help us with the latest baby to come along, it also helped us with our 3rd child who was delayed a bit in learning to speak, and tended to use her hands like they were in mittens instead of freely moving her fingers. She was 2 at the time, and I was beginning to get a bit concerned. After a few weeks of playing the Signing Time videos, she was signing like crazy, and using her fingers to spell every word she saw. Her language development exploded, and so did her other fine motors skills. For the next year or maybe two, this child would sign while she was speaking audibly. Perhaps she is a "hands-on" learner, and this was just the tool she needed. We may never know, but we are grateful that the Lord sent it our way at such an important time in her life.
So for all you readers with babies, I just wanted to share our experience with you and to point you toward this great resource for helping you and your baby. It truly helps with the temper tantrums, while helping to accelerate their language development.
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