The Miracle of Baby Sign Language

I read an article about baby signing when I was newly pregnant, and my curiosity was so piqued that I decided I would try it with my baby when the time came, just to see if it really worked. Boy did it ever!

It worked so well that in just a few months I began experiencing a sense of sadness and deprival for babies who weren't taught sign language, because they weren't given the abundant ability to communicate that my baby had. Signing with her was amazing! I can't wait for another opportunity to teach a baby to sign so I can communicate again with a genius little baby brain that can talk before it can speak.

At first it was frustrating. I was overwhelmed that there were at least 100 baby signs and I had to know them all before I could use them. Then the fact that I had to get good at signing regularly as I talked to my baby so she could learn the signs intimidated me. But I formed the plan to pick five basic signs for things I discussed with my baby often (signs that had to do with everyday things like eating). I decided that once she'd started doing a couple of the first signs, I'd gradually add one at a time. I discovered there were more than five signs that I remembered off the top of my head simply from the reading I'd done. All of the signs are fairly obvious, so it's no trick to keep track of which sign means what. And after about a week of signing to my baby, it became a habit.

But the major frustration was trying to get her to pay attention so she could realize I wasn't just waving my hands in her face for fun while saying the same word over and over. I worried she would never get it and I was doing all this work for nothing and she'd miss out on all the amazing claims of benefit I'd heard linked to baby signing. I kept reminding myself that what I'd read said that babies start signing on average between 9 and 12 months old, and that when your baby starts trying to wave bye-bye that's a good indication that she's ready to pick up on baby signing. My baby didn't wave bye-bye until well after I thought she should. Maybe it's because at 10 months she started signing and was too busy using her hands to say other things to learn "bye-bye". When she finally caught on that I was teaching her something and actually started signing I was relieved and encouraged.

And thrilled! Her first sign was for dog, a likely first word since we happen to have a dog who absorbed much of our daughter's fascination. I remember hearing her make what sounded like a pant-pant sound, the sign for "dog", while she was playing by herself. I wondered if she was trying to make the sign, or simply breathing noisily. After a few days of often overhearing her, I was convinced she was privately practicing a new skill before bravely performing it. Sure enough, within a week she pointed at the dog and panted. I was exuberant. From then on, nothing "dog" escaped her notice and she was making the sign all the time. Baby signing was no longer overwhelming or difficult for me to do. I was so motivated to add to her vocabulary. I was getting sick of dogs and wanted her to be able to tell me about something else. She gradually started learning other signs, delighting her grandparents, and making my life as her mom a breeze because she could tell me so many specific things.

For me, the real miracle moment of baby signing was when she heard a dog bark in the distance and made the dog sign. She wasn't even one year old and she was informing me that she knew that noise was a dog. Our dog rarely barked, and I had told her often when I heard neighborhood dogs barking that the noise was a doggy, but until that moment I didn't know she understood that. Without having taught her to sign, she wouldn't have been able to show me she knew. I had so much joy in being invited into her mysterious and hardworking mind each time she used her signs with me. And it was so special to be able to teach her grandparents the signs so they could know what she was saying, too.

Research shows a lot of benefits to baby sign language. Among them, the most readily recognizable one is a reduction in tantrums. Babies and toddlers are easily frustrated by their inability to concisely communicate their wants and needs. Let's face it, pointing and grunting don't give Mom much of a clue. That results in a big screaming fit because the frustration of the communication barrier is too much for someone so young to handle. And this happens repeatedly with the average little one. Baby signing can virtually eliminate this problem. If your baby can sign what he wants or needs and you can understand the sign, you can satisfy your little guy's requirements before he gets upset and throws a tantrum. My uncle told me a story, however, to prove that baby signing still can result in tantrums. But I think it will make you smile. He knew, he says, of a little boy who knew baby signs quite well. But when he wanted juice, he would approach the refrigerator and sign "juice" over and over again. Unfortunately, the fridge didn't know the sign for juice, and he was too young to realize his poor logic in expecting it to, and he would invariably throw a fit on the kitchen floor.

Teaching your baby to sign also reportedly results in a greater level of confidence, a higher IQ, a larger vocabulary, more concise language skills, and several other benefits to your baby. It is likely that a signing toddler will begin speaking later than a baby who is not taught to sign simply because he is dependent on his signs for communication and doesn't have the same urgent need to use words that a non-signing toddler has. This in itself is not a drawback, though. When a signing baby does begin to speak his vocabulary is already larger than a toddler's who learns his vocabulary and his speaking abilities simultaneously. To my surprise, my daughter learned only 20 baby signs before she began saying so many words and phrases that she lost interest in signing. She had no hesitation in speaking and preferred speaking to signing. My signing experience began and ended in the space of a few months. By 17 months of age she had completely quit using signs, was saying 100 words, learning 1 to 2 new words a day, and said 5 phrases. Obviously she would have been an eager talker even without the benefit of baby signs. But at 2 ½ years old now, people are still amazed at, not only her verbal abilities, but at her tremendous vocabulary. She loves words and never hesitates to pick up new ones (dirty mouths beware!). It was also extremely helpful as she was learning to speak that she could sign to me when I couldn't understand what she was saying. She learned to speak all of the words she could sign first and when that was accomplished, she started on words beyond her sign language vocabulary. When she started trying to say "light" and it kept coming out "yite" I thought I would never figure out what she was saying, and suddenly she frowned in frustration at me and flashed the "light" sign at me like I was stupid for not being able to figure out her superior verbal communication and needing the inferior baby signs. She did the same thing when she learned the word "rain," "kitty," and "banana," including the same, mature little dirty look.

If you haven't considered baby signing, I encourage you to do it. It opens up a whole wonderful world for both parent and baby, and the benefits are immeasurable. They also last a lifetime. Baby signing is a very simple thing for a parent to do, and the payback is overwhelming. If you are currently signing with your baby, be thorough with it. The more you sign with your baby and toddler the more your little one will gain from it, and the more he will be able to communicate to you. He will not get all of the vocabulary and language benefits of baby signs if you only teach him a few basic ones. Encouraging your baby to sign as much as possible will enable him to do two incredibly smart things. First, he will start making up signs of his own, because his language attempts will be so readily affirmed and successful that he will be encouraged to expand what he's able to say. My husband and I were delighted when our daughter, who would never sign the word "drink," told us she wanted a drink of my soda at Taco Bell (in a cup with straw like all fast-food beverages) by sticking her finger in her mouth and sucking on it as she pulled it out, imitating drinking from a straw. From then on, that was her sign for "drink," whether a straw was involved or not. Needless to say, we adopted the sign too and used it with her. The other truly smart thing your baby or toddler will start to do with baby signs is put two or more signs together to form phrases or sentences. With a wealth of signs to communicate many concoctions of meanings, his smart little baby brain will figure out how to combine meanings to give you a fuller picture of what he wants to say. For instance, he can combine the sign for "more" with the sign for "cookies" to tell you he wants "more cookies." You can also teach him to tag on "please" to his requests and respond to his met needs with a polite "thank you," an important thing to learn to use throughout life.

Clearly baby signing is growing in popularity as more and more people are convinced that it works and works with such terrific benefits. No parent should deny themselves and their baby this ease of communication and this pleasure of connecting with and understanding one another. There's no reason not to do it-it's painless and simple and takes very little effort or studying, and it is truly a joy to experience.