Is it considered signing if

[buddyleebaby]

she is consistantly making the same hand motion when she wants to nurse, but it's not the same motion I showed her?
We've been showing her the "milk" sign for a couple of months (I couldn't wait to start). For the past three days or so, she will look me in the eye (or my dh if I'm out of the room) spread her fingers, and rotate her wrist. Sometimes she opens and shuts her hand but mostly it's just the wrist going.
She does this when she wants to nurse and for a few seconds after she latches on.
Do you think she's trying to sign and just doesn't have the motion down? Or wishful thinking?

[o_mom]

I would say yes! If she kept saying "ick" or "mi-mi" for milk, you would still count it as a word.

Just do the same as you would for speech - repeat it back correctly. Do the milk sign back while saying "Oh, you want milk! OK!" (or nurse/milky/nummies or whatever spoken word you use for the sign). She will proabably eventually improve to do it correctly.

[mudder17]

Yes, it's definitely considered a sign if she's doing it repeatedly for the same thing. I counted Kaya's "hand-clapping" for "more" when she was around 10 months because she did it repeatedly. She didn't do it "correctly" until 14 months or so, I think. Like O_mom said, you would count a word as a word even if it wasn't pronounced quite right.

At almost 2, Kaya probably knows 300-500 words, signs and spoken words combined and there is one sign that she doesn't do the way it "should" be done. She made up her own sign for balloon and it really does work because I can tell what she's signing. I have no idea if her "sign" means something else in ASL, but that's okay. WE know what she means. :)

Yay for Abigail!

Oh, one more thing--I can't remember who it is now, but there is a famous deaf person who has several (4?) children and she does a lot of traveling. Anyway, she obviously signs to her children. Well, when her youngest was something like 4 months, she was in the hotel with just her and her daughter started motioning like she was talking on the phone. The woman was confused until she realized the phone was actually ringing! So 7 months is not too young to figure out a sign, especially if you've been exposing her to it consistently. :)

Eileen

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[aliceinwonderland]

I would count it as a sign, absolutely!!

DS makes his own version of the "milk" sign when he wants something to drink. He has done the same sign for months now :)

[mommy_someday]

I would definitely count it as a sign! I read a short book on signing with your baby and it said that you really have to pay attention to them to catch their first signs because they are often not exactly the way adults do them. My DS has an infatuation with cheese, but the sign is hard for him to do (palms together, then rotate hands in opposite directions like you're squishing something). He made up his own version of "more cheese" where he makes the 'more' sign with one hand and taps it in the open palm of his other hand. Not exactly what we showed him, but he definitely gets his point across!

Way to go, Abigail! :)

[Saccade]

>I would say yes! If she kept saying "ick" or "mi-mi" for
>milk, you would still count it as a word.
>

What if it's a consistent sound that your child made up out of nowhere, but uses consistently (i.e. doesn't sound like "milk")? It's a symbol, and it's shared because the child teaches it to the parent, but is it considered a word?

I guess the borderline is somewhat arbitrary -- after all, our kids have specific cries that mean certain things to us, but we don't call those words (we also don't call specific bird calls or vervet monkey alarm calls words, but they do have specific and consistent meanings).

ETA: with regard to the original question, yeah, I'd consider it a sign! :)

DS #1, 7/13/05
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[ellies mom]

Sounds like a sign to me. My DD signed and said ball when she wanted to nurse for a while because well, they are kind of ball shaped. She just started it on her own. I had been trying to teach her the sign for milk. Yeahh!!! That's just great.

[o_mom]

I would say yes, if it is a combination of speech sounds, then it's a word in my mind. I wouldn't include screaming or other non-speech sounds, though. I guess I look at it as if they were learning a different language - at that moment there are only two people who know it, so it probably won't survive, LOL! That's why I was always told to repeat the correct word back, so you don't reinforce an "incorrect" pronunciation.

For example, a friend's daughter had a specific word for car/wheeled things. It persisted for a long time because she would mimic it back. Girl points to a car and says "XXX" mom would say "Yes, that is an XXX" and so she kept on calling cars XXX for quite a long time. (I would say "Yes, that is a car" in that situation)

[Saccade]

>I would say yes, if it is a combination of speech sounds,
>then it's a word in my mind. I wouldn't include screaming or
>other non-speech sounds, though. I guess I look at it as if
>they were learning a different language - at that moment there
>are only two people who know it, so it probably won't survive,
>LOL! That's why I was always told to repeat the correct word
>back, so you don't reinforce an "incorrect" pronunciation.
>
>For example, a friend's daughter had a specific word for
>car/wheeled things. It persisted for a long time because she
>would mimic it back. Girl points to a car and says "XXX" mom
>would say "Yes, that is an XXX" and so she kept on calling
>cars XXX for quite a long time. (I would say "Yes, that is a
>car" in that situation)
>
>
>

Thanks! In our case, it's for nursing, so I don't particularly care that it's our own private word, KWIM ;) ?



DS #1, 7/13/05
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[mudder17]

Hee, hee, Kaya's word for nursing was "neh-neh" for the longest time, but then it morphed into meaning, "I want" something or other. People in the nursery used to ask me what she was saying because she was so clear and specific in "saying" that "word".


Eileen

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[RwnMayfair]

"Happiest Baby on the Block" mentions somewhere in it that many babies will make up their own signs for things, so yes, I'd say it's a sign even if it's not the one you've been showing her. :)

-Melissa

Taran, November 20, 2003
Elowen, August 20, 2005

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