Every baby that I know who was taught sign seems to be behind verbally. As far as I'm concerned it is not concerning due to the fact that they are able to express themselves, often stronger than those who are non-verbal. However, I wondered more of out of curiousity. TIA

__________________
Dawna (32)- mom to:

STOSH Born: Feb. 13th/04
JOAH Born: June 4th/05
NEVAEH Born: Sept. 26th/06

Hi! From a research perspective, no- there are not verbal delays associated with signing. Anecdotally, no delays with dd. She signed "more" at 8 months & spoke her first 2 words at 9 months. At age 2, she had 50 words & now at 27 months puts 2-5 together in phrases & sentences.

It could be a perspective thing- the kids who are signing are so expressive non-verbally that it can make their verbal skills seem lacking in comparison. There is such a wide range of *normal* speech development that it can be tough to judge.

__________________
Monica, mom to Siobhan 3/03

My daughter signs, and her pediatrician made the comment at her 18 month check-up that she thinks she's advanced in her vocabulary. So I guess she's not a late talker.

__________________

Dawna- I've read that the research says that teaching sign language does not delay their verbalness. But in my case as yours Irrissa does not speak. She signs a lot as you know and our Ped. wasn't concerned but she did make a quip that maybe we should lay off the signing some.

What I have concluded is that without the sign lang. the need/drive to learn to speak is very great because they have no other means of communication. But when you add a sign language to it, and they realize that they can communicate using their hands that the drive to speak isn't as strong because they already are communicating with you just through a different means.

When my brother was little all he had to do was point or grunt and we would get him whatever he wanted. Finally his Ped. told us that we were anticpating his every need and so he was not needing to be verbal to get his needs answered. So we started waiting until he tried to say the word, and back off some on figuring out what he needed before he tried to tells us verbally and that seemed to work. My fear is that with the sign language the same thing is happening with Irrissa. That I know what she wants so I just go get it before she even has to try and tell me verbally what she wants. It may be time to try and get them to verbalize more than just sign? I don't know?

__________________

Hey Dawna,

Research on this does say that signing is supposed to promote verbal language earlier. From my experience with Nathan this is true for us. He is using about 20 signs, but at about 14 months after really only saying dada and bye, his vocabulary really started growing. He now says about 30-35 words. Some very clearly.

Unless your Dr. has given you reason to be concerned I wouldn't be. I believe that once Stosh starts saying a few more words, it won't be long before his vocabulary becomes extensive. I know LeeAnna has experienced this with Rissa too. I'm not quite sure why they aren't talking more, but from every study that has been done, it has to be just a matter of time before they both start REALLY talking!!! Is Stosh saying anything?? I think it just depends on the baby too. Regardless of if you Sign with them or not, some are just more verbal than others!!! Just wanted to let you know what I've read and what I have experienced first hand with Nathan. Just think, there are still some babies neither signing or talking at this age!!! Atleast you have a way of communicating with Stosh!!! Cute pic of him by the way!

__________________
Jill Mommy to

Nathan

February 23,
2004

&

Bryn

August 10, 2006

I was just lurking, but I thought I would respond. I have four kids, my youngest is six months, and I signed with all three of my older kids. They all three spoke early and well. Some of it could be the child, as far as how early they speak. With my children, we didn't teach them more than twenty signs (my SIL's son knew like 150 and he didn't start talking until a little later). It makes me wonder if it depends on how extensively you use them and if you encourage them to say the word at the same time? Just a thought. I love sign, and intend to use it with this baby as well. It is wonderful to be able to communicate with your child!

__________________

What more can I say? Nothing...Sign does not delay speech.

Often though because a child can sign, she does not feel the need to push, shove, scream or demand verbally their wants needs and desires because they can simply sign it.

Sign reduces the frustration babies experience when they are learning to speak. Often people mistake screaming and tantrums for speech.

__________________

Responding kind of late... but I agree with what everyone said, I don't think it delays it at all. In fact, if anything, I think it helps... it encourages them to learn the concept of "communication" which I think in my son's case helped teach him to learn to talk.

__________________

Ditto ditto.

Signing with my son did NOT delay verbal output. In fact, first sign and first word were within a week of each other. And even tho his signs drifted away, his vocab is still above norm.

Willow's an early talker (it runs on both sides of our families) and she just signed "milk" to me earlier this week! she'd been understanding the sign for milk since about 6 months. her vocabulary is 12 words so far, balloon is her newest. "bah-DOON!" i'm the one with the problem signing, i have short-term memory problems so by the time i look at it on the baby signs website and then go to her, i've already forgotten it! i'm ordering some flash cards to keep with me

from what i've read, babies who sign become more verbal and have better vocabularies. although i don't know if it causes early or late speaking, i think that may just be inherited.

I've had a great experience with signing as well (although using ASL, not modified infant signs). At age two and a half, my son has a VERY extensive vocabulary and is very expressive. For example, when I said it was sunny today, he said, "Actually, I think it's gloomy now." because a cloud had passed in front of the sun. One day he told me "Mom, I would appreciate it if you would pick that up." when I had dropped something. He speaks very clearly and his vocabulary (both the amount of words he uses and the descriptiveness he uses in his sentences) are much, much further along than any of the non-signing kids in his playgroup. He also knows all his ABC's (verbally and in ASL), how to spell his name, his birthday and the birthdays of myself, my husband, and my daughter, as well as the difference between first, middle, and last name (and knows them for all four of us), all the colors (along with all their signs), all his days of the week and months of the year, and he loves to show people how to form their hands into the correct handshapes for various signs while he tells them how to do it. Right now he is talking to my 8 month old in another room and pretend playing with her and here's the running stream of what he's saying right now: "Now it is time to sleep. Good night, good night. Oh, did you wake up, Jaina? Are you going to drink some coffee? Noooo, babies cannot have coffee, silly. Babies only get momma's milk. You cannot have any coffee yet, Jaina, until you are all grown up. Aunt Donna's baby is going to come out very soon. She's going to be a little, teeny, itsy, bitsy baby. Definitely. We went to her baby shower at Aunt Glo's house, remember?. Did you see her presents? She opened them up. One was really humongous from Grandma. Do you want to sit on my lap?" Oops, I had to go check on them when I heard that part, I didn't want him picking her up. Anyway, people, including his pediatrician, and the other moms in our group constantly remark on how advanced he is with his vocabulary. Signing has definitely enhanced his vocabulary, his love of books, his love of songs, his letter recognition, etc.

Emma
Signs of Early Life

This thread has been up a while, but figured I'd add that Xander signs about the same number of signs as words that he verablized (a few more verbal words). We've found that since we started signing he has become MORE verbal and we see a direct correlation with him watching Signing Time videos where they repeat the word over and over verbally while signing it.

__________________

Just lurking, but I started using the "My Baby can Talk" dvd with my daughter at their recommendation of 10 months. She started signing about a month later. By 16 months she had a VERBAL vocabulary of about 100 words (plus still signing for words that are difficult to say like "dinosaur" and "flower"). Now at 20 months she's starting to string together 2 words and says more words than I could possibly count.

So, in our experience it didn't delay speech at all. I really believe that signing taught her how communication works. That only made her more eager to communicate in any way she could.

__________________
JJ
Mum to Ella Rose
Born 1/14/04

I am glad I ran into this thread, b/c I was just going to post the same Q.

Ethan is 18 mos old and is signing about 25 signs. However, he only says about 4 words. Mama, Dada, yeah, and Uh-oh. My only concern before starting him on signs was that it would delay speech, but I researched it before starting and everything said it does not delay. My ped. believes that if they don't have the need to talk they won't- so he is not a fan of signing. I really don't want to stop signing. Is 4 words at 18 mos something to be concerned about? He uses his signs wonderfully.

__________________
[center]
Jessica (27) Mommy to Ethan Gregory born July 12, 2004

Ethan's Website

LOVE this thread, and am finding the info VERY helpful!
THANKS!
S

__________________
HOUSEPLANTGIRL
Wife to my highschool sweetie for 11.5 years
Mommy to "Attitude Boy" (10-my Tween!)
"Angel Girl" (stillborn)
"Bean" (miscarried)
"Miracle Girl" (now in the Terrific 3's!!!!!)
"New Baby" (11 months now & trying to CLIMB!!!!!!)

De-lurking to say that we have signed with Rohan, though not as much as we probably should have, and if anything I think it has aided his verbal development. He has over 35 spoken words at 17 months, and uses a few phrases too. As Rohan started using verbal language more we started using signs less, but he and I still sign milk for when he wants to nurse.

Kari

__________________

I just came across this board and this thread because I was looking for info on this. My son is 21 months old and has a speech delay and is currently in speech therapy and our therapist recommended teaching him how to sign because it will probably get him to speak sooner and give him a way to communicate with us.

__________________

Studies have shown that signing does not delay speech. However, often parents who did not feel compelled to sign with their child at first did start signing when a speech delay was noticed. Similarily, many parents of children who have delays such as Down syndrome choose to sign with their child because they know that speech delays are common in children with certain disabilities.

Our son has Down syndrome and was able to sign more than 300 signs at age 2. Now he is 4 and talks up a storm (he is very verbal which is not always common for children with Down syndrome). Our one year old also knows a lot of sign and also talks a lot.

One thing we did a LOT of though was we always SAID the word slowly and clearly when we signed it. We also did a lot of our signing at face level so that attention could be drawn to the mouth so that our children could see our lips while watching the sign.

My daughter talked at 10 month.
My son not until after he was three
My next son was around a year
My 4th child was talking before his first birthday.

So i am going to say no. They all continued to sign until around age 3 and then it faded away.

__________________

I think so long as you sign AND use verbal to reitterate the WORDS they should be fine. my oldest started signing at 9 mos, we learned a new word every 2 days for almost 3 mos. BY his 1st bday we were signing sentences. I always used verbal with him. we signed though b/c he had no signs of wanting to speak and i was sick of not being able to communicate with him. he didnt speak till his 2nd bday (he said ma-, da-, ee-, THATS IT till age 2). My 2nd son started signing at 8 mos, now at 3 he blows peoples minds with his descriptiveness and proper use of pronouns, verb tenses, etc.

I think so long as a child understansd and CAN communicate it shouldnt matter HOW. We were worried that while my oldest could sign he coudlnt speak. we thought something was wrong with him. turns out he just had nothing he wanted to verbally say

__________________