Use Baby Signing to Strengthen Communication

What did you say?

One of the most frustrating stages in a child's development is during the toddler years when they're learning to speak. Toddlers have the tools to talk but their language skills haven't quite gotten to where what they want to say is heard correctly. They know what they're trying to say but the adults around them just aren't "getting" them. This causes frustration and irritation on both sides. What can be done to ease both baby and parents through this difficult time? The answer: Baby Sign Language.

History
Joseph Garcia is the man credited with bringing awareness to the development of Baby Sign Language. He began studying American Sign Language (ASL) in 1975 and eventually became a Certified Interpreter. Through his observations during his thesis, he noticed children of deaf parents learned to communicate with signs a lot sooner than hearing children did with oral communication.

During his research in 1986, he had a multitude of resources on deaf children and deaf parents and how these children develop their communication skills; however, he found very little about hearing children with deaf parents or deaf siblings. He got several hearing families to volunteer to try using signing with their hearing children. What he discovered was children who are exposed to signing from infancy learn to use the signs as young as six or seven months old!

Over the next 20 years, he'd go on publish several books, videos and multimedia tools for parents seeking a way to open the communication lines with their children - deaf, hearing or for those children who are simply unable to communicate verbally. Today, his methods are utilized all over the world.

Benefits
As Garcia shows through his work, and many parents have gratefully discovered, if a child can learn to communicate what they want without temper tantrums or screaming, everyone - parents, children and anyone who is in contact with the child - benefits. Here are a few: