Skip to main content

Baby sign language

So this kid never ceases to amaze me. Well, maybe he's my kid so i feel proud at every single thing he does (like pooping, in the potty of course). But just after 13 months old, he started to use sign language to speak back to us (like one day it just clicked i think, just like him deciding that he wanted to walk and was done with crawling). He did the sign for 'eat' when I was prepping dinner and i was amazed! Yes baby, we are going to eat!!

We started signing with him around 8 months old. J and I did a small 'baby sign language' class when he was around that age just to get used to it ourselves. I also learnt that sign language is just like any other language; the American Sign Language (ASL) is different from the Dutch. And the Malay sign language is probably different as well.

To standardize things we decided to follow the Dutch sign language. Meaning i would still be speaking Malay to him, but use the Dutch sign. We went to Baby Gebaren in Almere and the teacher Desiree was really good!

After the sign 'eat' then really quickly came the things that we did over and over for months like drink, bathe, milk, music, ball... All in the span of a couple of days. It really blew me away because all this time he didn't do anything back to us at all. But i guess he was always watching :D

Lennox doing the sign for Horse in Dutch




Here's a list of  other stuff that he can sign now (at 14 months)

more
cry
baby
book
star
car
bicycle
painful (ouch)
sun

bird
dog
cat
sheep
horse
giraffe
rabbit

Of course his signs are not perfect. His flapping bird sign kinda looks like the dog sign. And other animals sometimes are also 'dog'. But it's pretty awesome to watch how when i say a word from a book, he looks at me to check what the sign is.

And it makes life SO much easier when he can tell me what he wants!

Here's a video of him reading the Dutch version of 'Brown Bear Brown Bear what do you see'. Well actually he just likes to look at the picture then go to the next page. It doesn't look like much but the subtle difference in the signs are.

If you're thinking of doing sign with your kids, i would say go for it! Especially before they start being able to vocalise what they want. It sure makes life with a toddler a lot less frustrating!


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Baby-friendly Banana & Date Muffin

We always have bananas at home. ALWAYS. It's the perfect snack during the day especially before and post workout. Also, bananas with almond/peanut butter on top?? YUMMY. When we have too many ripe bananas though, i like to cut them up and freeze them for a smoothie later in the week. Earlier this week i had one measly overripe banana and lots of dates leftover so i decided to whip up a banana-date muffin. A quick google search gave me recipes where i didn't have all the ingredients on hand at home, so i came up with something on my own. And guess what, it turned out awesome! Ingredients: 1 ripe banana 10 dates, pitted 2 eggs 5 tbs plain flour pinch of baking soda pinch of cinnamon
Post a Comment
Read more

First day of playschool jitters (for me)

About 3 weeks ago Lennox started playschool. In Holland they can start with something called 'peuterspeelzaal' (toddler playgroup) from 2 years old. It is 2 times a week, about 3 hours each time. Since Lennox is bilingual and speaks Malay at home, he can also go 4 times a week when he becomes 2.5 years old. Although we have been going to playgroups in the past (since he was about 8 months old), i always had to stay with him for the duration. So for him and for me, it was a pretty big step to drop him off to the hands of the teachers (they call them ' jufs ' here). The only other times Lennox has been on his own is with family and one other time with a babysitter (when the birth of Sterling impending and we wanted to be prepared). His peuterspeelzaal has a pretty decent size, about 14 kids to 2 teachers. The kids range from 2-4 years old. From 4 years old the kids go to "Groep 1" which is like nursery (N1/N2) for us in Singapore. The first weeks have gone...
Post a Comment
Read more

Flying alone for 13 hours with a toddler and a baby?!

Just the thought of flying alone with baby Sterling (then 3.5 months) and Lennox (exactly 2 years) was scary and intimidating. I even considered NOT flying to Singapore because i was afraid that i wouldn't be able to handle the 13 hour flight alone with them. But that would mean that my whole family (sister, brothers, grandma, nephews, nieces, uncles, aunts etc etc) and my Singapore friends would not be able to see the new baby... and it had already been a year since they saw Lennox. So i told myself i had to do it! And i did! Here's a few things i did to prep for the flight and to make the flight that much less scary: I chose a  night flight  instead of day time ones: obviously, to follow their sleep rhythm. I was lucky enough to have a choice of 9pm flight instead of a 11am one; I made sure they had a  'regular/boring' day  with naps etc, so that they were not overly excited or over tired; confirm my baby bassinet . Flying with KLM with a baby for the fir...
Post a Comment
Read more