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This week Julia and her daughter Amelie join us from New Zealand. Julia shares her story of raising Amelie bilingual (French & English), and doing Baby Sign Language. Check out the video at the bottom of the page, it is hilarious!
I’ve known I would do baby sign since before I was pregnant. I never met any babies doing it, but being a speech language pathologist I knew plenty about how well it worked in pre-verbal children to reduce frustration and I also knew just how much ‘language’ our little babies have in them. What I didn’t plan on was raising her bilingual as well. That came after we picked up French hitchhikers and both being English-French bilingual ourselves (living in New Zealand and dreaming of France) thought – why not speak French to Amelie now?! Not wanting to wing it, I took out some library books and we made the decision to jump in while she was still only 4 months. While it felt like a leap into the unknown I took heart in knowing that whatever confusion or language delay bilingualism may cause to start, she would have her baby signs. We speak to her in French, and sign, and she is learning English more passively from the world around her … apart from everyone being gorgeous and wanting to use their French with her whenever possible such as Bonjour! and Au Revoir! And they do the signs as well. She’s a well-known baby in the village and the old ladies delight in her baby sign manners.
The signing was easy for us. We printed the core photos and put them on the fridge. I can’t remember exactly when her first sign was, 9 or 10 months maybe? – it was milk. Quick and fleeting, but certainly there and easy to reinforce. Looking back we realize it was earlier than that – with finished. But it was so uncontrolled and flappy we didn’t recognize it! I can recall thinking, “that’s a bit autistic… do all babies to that?” Oops. From there the concept was cemented and we were away. She was signing from the minute she woke and we were jogging our brains for what that one was! She’s also a bit of a sloppy signer so not everything was completely clear straight away. I remember when chicken, ouch and iPad were all the same! Then something difficult happened around her first birthday – we weren’t keeping up with her thirst for more signs so she began making up her own! Suddenly she had her arms in the air, was pinching her fingers and twisting her wrists … what? What’s that?! ….. Letters? The fridge magnets?? Says who? Says Amelie – and so it stuck.
After a few more of those occurrences we bought a dictionary and got proactive. If we talked about it, we gave it a sign. And she loves, loves her signs. Just the same as toddlers that parrot back what you say, she was signing back everything I was reading and talking about or simply labeling her environment. We always found it funny when she made this huge effort to put everything down, normally topple over in the process, and do a sign for something she was carrying. But her delight when we then said the word and signed it back was unmistakable. She’d laugh as though to say, “Yep! Well done.” and pick everything up again and continue on. Our favorite signs though have been for the names of all the French travelers who have stayed with us and helped look after her. From Boris who smokes, to Caroline and her jewellery. What a beautiful way to greet someone – by name. And all of these people have left determined to do baby sign with their own children one day.
So now, at 20 months, Amelie is a delightful and chatty little French speaker who has started to use two word phrases. And I thank baby sign every day because we all still rely heavily on her signs to communicate as she speak-signs the complicated and lengthy syllable structure of French. And we’ll continue to use it as English makes its way into her everyday language to back up meanings and draw connections between the two languages. But most of all I thank baby sign for helping us raise a happy and confident toddler. My heart swells with love and pride when I dream about her start in life and being able to communicate with the world as soon as she had something to share. Long may it continue in as many languages as this trilingual toddler chooses to embrace.
Je t’adore mon petit coeur!
Today’s signing story comes from Spain. Elena is eight months old and is signing more. Elena’s mom is a veteran of baby sign language, and also taught her oldest daughter Eva how to sign.
I absolutely love your site. I have been using it since 2011 with my older daughter and now am starting signing with my younger daughter. Here is Elena doing her first sign, more. Thanks so much for all you do!
Today in our signing signing stories we have Ted and his mom Cam. Check out the video and hear about all the creative signing they have been up to!
We liked the idea of signing with our baby boy, Ted, and started almost immediately (we were new to signs, so we wanted to give ourselves plenty of time to get the hang of it).
When, by 11 months, Ted still wasn’t using any signs, we decided to go to a proper baby signs class in case we were doing something wrong. His first sign, more, turned up a week before his first birthday and three days before the class was about to start!
Since then, he’s been picking up new signs every day and now, almost four months later, he uses about 70. He doesn’t normally enjoy just showing them off without a reason, so we had to trick him into doing these
It blows our minds that we can chat away with him all day long despite the fact that he can only actually say a handful of words! He loves his signs, and watching the videos on your website is one of his favorite shows.
This is what made me giddy today:
As I was putting Ted to bed, we were reading From Head To Toe. At the moment, the page with the seal is his favorite, and we kept coming back to it over and over again. Finally, he started pointing to the window the way he does when he can hear the neighbors’ dog, and I realized he was asking about the seal. I told him there were no seals in the yard, because they lived in the sea. He looked at me, and excitedly signed ocean, as he does when I tell him we’re going to the beach. I couldn’t believe it. I now know that my 16mo knows seals live in water, without ever having seen one, yet!
He’s also starting to get really inventive with his signs. I showed him how to blow a dandelion, and the next time he saw one and wanted it, he signed pinwheel flower. Apparently, we’ve only ever blown at pinwheels until now, and in his mind that’s what dandelions are most closely related to. 🙂
Thank you, guys! Your website is amazing and the videos are the most helpful tool ever!
Cam & Ted
This week, our signing star is Jackson. Jackson was taught by his mom Marissa, and they share their story. Check out the adorable video of Jackson doing the sign for more.
My son is a week shy of 8 months and we have been doing signs with him since the week of his 6 month birthday.
We decided to begin signing on a regular basis with the obvious eat, all done/finished, and more but we also signed change for diaper changes, water, play and “toys along with many other at random signs without consistency.
Within the last week he has signed change 5 times (only with poop in his diaper) and all done in the eating context which is great! And today he signed water.
I’m submitting a video of him signing more and what sounds like an attempt at saying more along with the first sign. I was filming for another project I’m participating in called “1 second every day” but I got lucky and filmed his first more this is technically his 3rd sign.
He is also shaking his head no which is very surprising. He is easily calmed by signing while singing the alphabet as well 🙂 I think the dual visual and auditory pair is what works well.
It’s so rewarding to be able to communicate and understand his desires. We have made a sign chart and plan to begin extensive incorporation.
