Sometimes, even often, you wish you could understand your baby's cries and get in a heartbeat what they need… It's not easy not knowing what your baby tries to tell you and how to best attend to them!
- With a little patience and motivation, sign language could be of a great help.
- It's all about teaching your little one to express their needs through gestures.
- Eating, sleeping, drinking, playing, cuddling… All the basic needs of a young child are associated with a sign that is simple to learn and perform, to help your baby communicate with those around him or her.
- Tempting, isn't it? But how to do it? A bit of online research should help you discover the basics of ASL (American Sign Language).
- Then, you should know that there are various very complete books to start learning sign language.
- Through pictures and drawings, they will show you the basics, so you can easily reproduce and help your child learn them as well.
- Some organizations and parents' groups also offer information and baby sign language 101 courses, which is a little more friendly and fun than doing it alone!
- But when can you start? Not too early, you should wait until your baby is about 6 months old to start talking to him/her with signs.
- Let your baby observe you, and associate the sign to the action again and again. Your baby will soon start recognizing the signs and understand by herself!
- However, it is necessary to wait until around 10-12 months for your baby to start reproducing signs.
- Research has shown that babies stop signing as soon as they master speech, so don't worry, learning to use sign language won't have a negative impact on your baby's ability to speak.
- So if you are tempted by the adventure, don't hesitate and go for it. You'll see, it will be nothing but happiness and complicity between you and your baby. And let's be honest, it's a pretty cool thing to show your friends as well…
