How our baby-signing journey begins...
While teaching as an instructor years ago, the parents of one of my 2 years old class brought up the use of "Baby Signing Time" to me when I mentioned that their girl seems very expressive in her speech and learning concepts ( as mentioned in my previous blog before, under baby-signing.)
So after I had Reagan, I started to teach him the signing for milk when he was just an infant, just to "trial" to see if it works. And yes it did....at 7 months old, he spoke his first word "MILK" to us, which is also the first and only baby sign I taught him during that time (as recorded here). Speaking his first word at 7 months is enough to impress and got everyone in the house jumping in awe and excitement. And they began "pushing" me to teach him more baby signings. From then on, every time he wants milk, he either sign to us or just cried out "milk milk!" I began researching more on baby signing, introduce it to him and allows him to naturally grasp it at his own pace. It was near 1 year old onwards that he's able to do more signings back to us. Well and that's pretty much how our baby- signing journey begins...
Like other mummies, I did hear of rumours that baby signing causes delay in speech at the later stage. However I took it with a pinch of salt, as so far what I've witnessed (esp the learning development of that particular 2 years old student in my class) it seems to be the opposite of the truth. I think it is more convincing if the individual that mentioned this has experienced the delay in speech after teaching his or her own child baby-signing or witnessed or know a child ( not just heard from somewhere) who learned signing and did encounter the problem. So far I've always heard of it as a rumor but yet to witness any negative feedbacks from other real parents who taught their baby signing.
It reminds me of another saying I used to hear before (as a rumour too), that you cannot teach a young child too much, otherwise when they're older, they will show no interest in learning. ??!! Seriously where do they hear this from?! THIS IS SO OPPOSITE OF THE TRUTH !!!! And I've so many reasons and facts to defiant this ridiculous rumour...
Anyway back to the topic on baby signing, there are also many who have never encountered baby signing and also doing well from other inputs too. So to me, baby signing is just another kind of learning or another type of input for babies. Good to expose, but certainly not a compulsory.
Still, thinking back on our journey of baby signing, below are some of the benefits which I like to highlight in my blog entry... mainly based on what Reagan and I have derived from signing...
How baby signing benefits my baby and I
-Strengthen parent-child bond and boost his learning and self-esteem
Signing as a baby before he can speaks increase the number of positive interactions between us. It allows Reagan to relate to the things he sees around him and although he cant communicate to me vocally yet, his ability to sign encouraged him to initiate a conversation with me as a baby, which then of course I will respond positively back to him.
For eg. When Reagan sees a flower, he did the sign for "flower" to me , which of course motivates me to praise him for doing the sign correctly, and carry on the conversation by telling him the colour of the flowers or count the number of flowers with me. This example shows that as a baby, he has attempted to initiate a conversation with me by signing and I was motivated to carry on the learning by adding more inputs. In other words, it helps him to relate to the things around him and aids me to provide more inputs on the subject which he signed and shows interest in. He also knew that it is a way to get my positive responds effectively when he relate to something using signing. So before my baby can speak, he has signed, communicated and learned more new information from me which therefore helps to boost his self-esteem, confidence ( more willing to express what he learned) and also strengthen our bondings.
- Early input of good manners
Baby Reagan is able to sign "thank you", "please" and "sorry" as a baby, which means at an early age he understood the use of the above gestures and able to apply it during situations that requires him to use it. I believe it is good and necessary to cultivate good manners from young, and when they're older, it gradually becomes a good habit and you don't have to constantly remind them to" use" their manners.
- Aids in teaching him to read
I feel this is probably the most important benefit of baby signing for Reagan and me. I'll never know that baby Reagan can recognise words before he can speak, IF he didn't sign to me the words he could "read". Since he had a "collection" of vocabs that he could already sign, I was able to use those vocabs and teach him to read them in words form. So although he has yet to be fully developed in his speech, he could already show me he can recognise words by signing what the words mean (video). Therefore it motivates me to teach him more and more words to give him a head start in his reading skill. And when his speech development comes in, hopefully he'll be soaring off from there.
The entire episode of baby signing learning with Reagan has been a fulfilling one. Each time my baby successfully learned a sign and used it correctly, it brings me so much joy and excitement and always motivate me to teach him more. I'll probably expose my 2nd boy baby signing too because since Reagan has already gone through the learning of signing, I knew by then he will be happy looking forward to be his younger brother's "little teacher" too !
So byebye signing time, time for your retirement....but we shall see you again very soon!
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