Armin Brott (Mr. Dad) has a post on his website about teaching your baby sign language. As a parent of a child who learned a few signs before she hit 1, I can concur that yes, it does work and no, it did not delay the development of speaking in The Girl. I wonder how the myth began that babies who learn sign language could have delayed speech? It certainly isn’t the case with The Girl who, at 2/12, is a chatterbox.
The signs she learned were pretty basic – “please” and “more” being the 2 she seemed to use quite often.
The best part of teaching her sign language was that it seemed to reduce a bit of frustration in The Girl. Signing gave her a way to express herself, ask for something and have us respond to what she needed. And it was quite easy. As Brott’s article points out, consistency, repetition and saying the words as we signed them seemed to be key factors in how quickly The Girl picked up the signs.
If you are thinking about the sign route, I would highly recommend it.
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