Teach Your Baby Sign Language
How to Introduce Signs

When you teach your baby sign language, how and when you introduce signs to your baby is a contributing factor to your baby’s signing success. I cannot tell you how many parents or caregivers will give up teaching their hearing babies sign language simply because they do not understand how to correctly introduce signs. The truth is, you can sign all you want, but if your baby is not aware of what you are doing, your chance for success might not be all that high.

When introducing signs, you will want to have your baby’s full attention. This will help make it easier for baby to make the connection between the sign and the object. Ensuring you have eye contact with your baby when you go to introduce a sign is the best way to know your baby is focusing on your actions. You will also want to sign just below your child’s line of vision and you should say the word out loud while making the sign. When signing with very young babies, make the sign close to your face as this is where most infants focus their attention when you speak to them.

Dr. Joseph Garcia, researcher and founder of the Sign with Your Baby program, recommends you take advantage of "gazes" to introduce new signs. According to Garcia, there are three distinct types of gazes: expressive, pointed, and chance mutual. These gazes are considered excellent opportunities for teaching signs.

Teach Your Baby Sign Language - Expressive Gazes

EAT

The expressive gaze happens when your baby has a need or wants to express a feeling or ask a question. You will often see this gaze when it is feeding time - your baby will look at you as if trying to say, "I’m hungry, where’s the food?" Or, when he sees the food or the bottle or gets near the breast, he gets excited and looks up at you with expectation. This would be a great time to show him the sign for EAT or MILK as you undoubtedly have his full attention in this moment.

Teach Your Baby Sign Language - Pointed Gazes

BIRD

Pointed gazes occur when you and your child look at something at the same time and then look at each other. As an example, imagine this scene. You and your baby are sitting together outdoors when suddenly a little bird zips past and perches itself in a tree branch right next to you. You and your baby look at the bird and then look at each other. Since you both saw the bird this would be an opportune time to teach your baby the sign for BIRD by saying bird while you model the sign. If your baby continues to watch you, you might point to the bird, say it, and then sign and say it again.

Teach Your Baby Sign Language - Chance Mutual Gazes

MOMMY

A chance mutual gaze occurs when you and your baby happen to look at each other for no apparent reason. This would be a good teaching opportunity for a sign like MOMMY. You can sign for example, MOMMY loves you (while also saying it out loud). Alternatively, if perhaps you were getting ready to read a book together, you might say, "We’re going to read a book," and sign BOOK. Then show baby the book and again sign and say the word book.

Whenever you are introducing signs, try to model the sign just before, during and directly after you show baby the item related to the word you are trying to teach. Make the sign a couple of times each time you use it. Babies are attracted to movement so you may want to sign with a little more emphasis or exaggeration at first so that your baby really sees what you are doing. Remember to speak the word while you sign it.

Teach Your Baby Sign Language - Sign Example

BOOK

To help illustrate the above point, let’s imagine we are introducing the sign BOOK to baby for the first time. To begin we will tell baby that we are going to read a book while signing BOOK. We then show baby the book and sign and say it again while slightly exaggerating the movement. When we are finished reading the book, we’ll sign and say it once more. Once your baby begins signing back, you can relax the way you introduce signs since your baby will understand that hand movements mean something and will likely be more attentive to them. Read more about this signing stage in the How Your Baby Signs articles.

Speaking of books…books are a great way to introduce signs that your baby does not ordinarily come in contact with or see regularly. For example, most of us don’t see penguins, elephants or zebras all that often! Using a good picture book is a great way to teach your baby signs such as these without having to run off to the zoo everyday!

Repetition is the mother of skill so the more you can sign and say a word to baby while you have his attention, the more likely your baby will be to connect the sign with the words and objects being shown. Once your baby makes this connection it is only a matter of time until he begins trying to sign back to you.