Monday, March 06, 2006

Hooooo...howoooo

I swear, the B has started trying to communicate with us.

All manner of squeaks and coos and other assorted noises have begun to emerge from her little gullet. She had a one-sided conversation with the elephant in the mobile over her bassinet last night before she went to sleep. Tonight, while Jacky B was kickin' ass and takin' names, she was making this amazing "hooooooo....howooooo" noise at the mister over and over, and she was grinning at him when he did it back. I realized too late that I should have gotten out the video camera (it was actually within arm's length, but I was too busy trying to stifle my giggling so it wouldn't distract her).

Also, and I realize this is dangerously close to that "my child is a genius on the scale of Bean from Ender's Game" post, and I'm absolutely not certain that this isn't just a big coincidence, but, well, it's possible that she might be picking up the first of the baby sign language I want to teach her.

The argument for: I've only ever used one sign with her...for "food" or "formula". I haven't done it every blessed time she's gotten a bottle, but I've done it a lot and I've explicitly connected it with the bottle. I have started to use it when I think she's starting to get hungry, and in the past two days, she's started to sign it back to me...but only when she's actually been hungry. The couple of times that she was whimpering because she was wet or just lonely, she refused to sign it back and kept whimpering until I figured out what she wanted. The sign she is doing is, in my opinion, as close an approximation of what I've been signing to her as she is possibly capable of, given her level of control over her arms and her hands. If she were actually trying to use the sign to communicate, this is exactly what it would look like. She is not just chewing on her fingers, as she does sometimes to comfort herself. When I think it's possible she's doing the sign, she puts her little fist to the corner of her mouth without actually chewing on it, which is very close to what I've shown her.

The argument against: She is, by everything I've read, too young to understand what I'm doing and too young to connect the concept with the gesture. They don't even advocate that you start signing to them until they're 4-6 months old, for heaven's sake, and she's barely three months old. Also, I realize that my desperate desire to communicate with her could easily be manifesting itself in a delusion that she is beginning that process.

I reserve judgment on whether she's actually doing it or not, but I see no reason not to introduce a second sign to her. You can't start too early, and even if she's not really signing back at me yet, it's only a matter of time as long as I'm consistent.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You are absolutely right to start signing with B. Just because science says she's incapable of understanding doesn't mean it is so. I wouldn't think she would catch on so quickly with a second sign while she is still mastering the first, but introducing it will certainly get her familiar. In two more weeks you may notice that she understands both correctly. Babies are just so amazing.

TheGirard said...

I have a friend who has a boy that picked up the kiddie sign language early. Unfortunately, when it came time to have him communicate with words, he was apprehensive and kept signing.

Kathy said...

That whole, "they delay talking if you teach them sign" thing has been proven untrue in every study done on this subject. Kids who sign and also begin talking late would most likely have done so anyway...and without the signs, they would have been extra frustrated at not being able to communicate at all.

The studies uncovered that once children who sign begin to talk (again, kids do this stuff in their own time, so early, late, whenever) learn words faster because they already understand the concept that each thing they see has something attached to it that allows them to convey the idea of that thing to another person. They learn words for the things they knew how to sign even faster than that.

B can be a late talker if she needs to be, but I'll feel better knowing she can communicate with me in whatever way she's comfortable with.