Please share your experiences with us.

If you would like to add your comments about how sign language has helped you communicate with your child, please send us an email at feedback@littlesigners.com and we'll be sure to add your experiences to our feedback page! 

My little grandson is now 19 mo. old and still signing and learning more words everyday (verbal).  Recently, my daughter-in-law said that she went to get a sleeping Joshua from his car seat and his little hand was signing "cookie" over and over plus she said he was whispering the word "cookie" along with his hand signs...well, now we know what that pretty little blonde head dreams about!  We also have a new little student...McKenna Elise.  She is only 3 months old right now.... "Mammy" and Joshua already sign to her! - Ronnie Midcap

Maya is 9 months old (she was 6 weeks early, so adjust accordingly) and we were good about signing during month 8, but around month 9 we were falling off the wagon.  She began crawling around her 8th month birthday, and to encourage her I would sit across the room and cheer her on to come to me.  In an un-deliberate way I was using my hands to call her to me while I said "come here" in a sort of upside down ""bye bye" motion. She finally tired of the game and decided to turn the tables ... She has started to sit back down while still across the room and signal the hand motion to me!!  And she gets results! I go over to her right away.  It blew me away the first time she did it, the second time it was in front of my husband and was definitely not a fluke! So now, we're trying harder to sign with her, doing 'eat', 'more', 'bath', 'milk', and of course the new one, 'come here'. - Anila

It took Jizal (12 mo. old) exactly one week of my signing with her after taking your class to start signing "more."  Her older brothers were thrilled and made a huge deal about it, so now she signs it and then immediately claps for herself!  Many thanks again - Lee Ann

My 11 month old grandson stared using his little chubby hands to sign about 3 months ago.  Grammy was so proud since I am the one who keeps him in the day and got him started, me and Rachel Coleman! (Creator of Signing Time)  Anyway, seems he was at home standing on a step that was to high...Dad was signing "NO, NO,NO"...which Little Joshua very forcefully signed back, YES, YES, YES!"  Well, Dad got closer to him with the no's and Joshua did not back down...he pushed Daddy's hand down and signed in his face "YES YES YES"...and verbally  told him.  My son's sad response, "Mom, my little son yells at me in sign language, what have we done!"  Through my tears and laughter I explained to him, enjoy this because sooner or later it will only be loud, verbal "NO"'s. I also felt like singing, "nananana". - Ronni Midcap


I am thrilled that my son has learned to sign "milk, more, yes" and is working on "food" -- can you tell we mostly sign at the high chair?  : )  Last month, when he signed 'milk', Chris and I almost leapt out of our seats! Then, he did 'More', which was the best - because that is VERY helpful in feeding! He mostly signs "milk" for any time he's thirsty - 'water' hasn't sunk in yet and is probably a more difficult sign for a one-year old to master. Jack was 11 months when he started signing back to us; we started with him at nine months. I am glad we saw the videos you show in class, because Jack adapted the signs just like the little ones in the videos and I recognized them immediately. - Kim Towne

Eureka!  My son is signing!  I can't remember now exactly when I started signing with him -- I think it was around 7 months.  I made it to 1 year without getting a sign back and was giving up hope -- I decided to take a 3 to 4 week break from signing (truthfully I think I was giving up but didn't want to admit it) and all of a sudden at 13 months Matthew started signing "milk" and "more"!  I think he just wasn't ready and I was lucky that I didn't stop signing so far in advance of him being ready that he had forgotten the signs -- but still a month off and still remembering is quite amazing.

He is now 14 months and he signs: milk, more, eat, all done, ball, bath, dog, fish, light, and flower.  And I can see that he is learning apple, tree, cheese, and cracker and I am sure they will come out any day!

Thank you for all your encouragement! This has been the most incredible thing that we have done with Matthew since conquering our breastfeeding troubles when he was just born.  It use to be that when he was done eating he would throw a tantrum -- now he just signs "all done" and we respect his wishes, even if we want him to eat more, as we want to encourage communication and really, we can't force him to eat anyway.  We just offer him food again sooner then we would have otherwise! - Diana Greenberg

Just wanted to tell you about my grandson, Cameron Malcolm.  He's almost 20 months old and has been watching your [Signing Time] videos since he was about six months old.  He has no need to learn sign, but I wanted to teach him because I thought that it would help him, to express himself before he would be able to say words.  A whole new world has opened up to Cameron, his family and friends.  I have watched this little boy sit, quietly, through a video signing and enjoying himself.  He uses his signs to say or ask for things.  At daycare, his teachers have asked his Mom if he was signing as they knew he was doing something, but not sure what.  Watching him grow is so sweet, seeing him use his hands in sign, is beautiful.  He loves all three of the videos and now signs before the children start to sign.  I know that I have given Cameron something that he will use and grow in and that every time he uses his sign, he'll know that Grandma loved him so much that she wanted him to have a gift.  - Judy Wallace

Thank You for helping me teach my baby to sign.  My son is 11 months old and has started to sign over the past few weeks.   I have been signing to him for several months and finally it is starting to click!   He is doing three signs so far - "light, more and all done".   I can not tell you how excited I was to see him do his first sign, which was for light.   The other two followed shortly after and I can't wait for the next one.  Thanks again for the info and encouragement, I am looking forward to finding another class to attend! -  Laura Fraser

Hello my name is Bethany and I am currently attending Flagler College and majoring in Deaf Education.  Unlike most students here in my major, I want to teach hearing children to sign.  I often get funny looks when I tell people that.  My thought is that pre-schools all over the country now have Spanish classes (I know because I worked at one for a year), but I believe that Sign Language is being highly overlooked.  I began teaching a 2 year old little girl sign language, which she picked up rather quickly and loved to learn more.  Why is that any less important than learning Spanish?  I just wanted to say that I think it's wonderful that you have created this program, and hopefully someday the world will see how useful, helpful, and beautiful Sign Language is.  ~Bethany~

I started teaching baby signs at 9 months, and my daughter started signing at 11 months. Now, at almost 17 months, she knows 50+ signs. She is the happiest, most content toddler I know. She rarely has temper tantrums because she can communicate to me what she needs. While many toddlers learn to say "NO" mine says "yes" because she can sign and I reiterate what she is saying and she confirms her need/want. She can tell me safety signs, such as when she's hungry, wet, thirsty, hot, cold - all of which are wonderful. In a restaurant recently, she began signing cold - cold and I asked if she was cold and she said "yes", and I looked up and sure enough, she was under a vent. I have been encouraging all parents to sign with their babies - it's so easy and fun to do. -  Cheryl, mother to a delightful, terrific 17 month old girl.

My son perseverated on the sign "airplane". He wanted to know all about them, and he knew he could get me to say the word and talk to him about airplanes just by signing "airplane". He signed this word many times a day until he was able to master the pronunciation of the word. Signs give children a tremendous amount of control and changes their role in language acquisition to that of a passive observer to that of an active
participant. -Cool, eh? - Linda Easton

I love the fact that before my child can express her needs verbally, she's able to tell me what she needs using sign language. - Stacey Rothberg, Parent of a 1 year old daughter

I just found your site, and it is absolutely wonderful!  I work with children, and I always recommend to parents that they try to use sign language to help their babies communicate with them.  Now I can also recommend your website, so they can find out about the research and the facts behind my suggestions.  Thanks for creating such a comprehensive
collection of articles that discuss all of the benefits of signing with babies.  It's really fantastic! - Maura Fay

I adopted an 17 month old baby from Russia.  The only language she knew when she became a member of our family was Russian.  Sign language has been extremely helpful in helping us transition from Russian to English.  It's made our communication much easier and less frustrating. - Sandy Rodney, Mother of a 2 year old daughter and Teacher

My son has been in daycare at the JCC for 6 mths now.  The teacher uses sign language with the kids and my son uses those signs at home now.  It's wonderful to see how excited my son gets when he knows that we understand what he wants.  Even his grandparents are signing with him!  - Mindy Weintraub, Parent of an 18 month old son

We began teaching signs to our baby several months ago.  Now, at fourteen months, he is able to tell us when and what he wants to eat or drink, if he's too hot or cold, if something hurts, and to ask for permission to do things.  Likewise, we can also communicate with him which greatly reduces the frustration of toddlerhood. -  David Johns, Father of a 14 month old son.

When my daughter, Owen was about 8 months old, I saw a segment on a news show about teaching babies to sign.  It made perfect sense to me, so I did a little research on it on the net.
We ended up teaching her signs for bottle, food, ears, and bedtime to name a few. I
wanted her to be able to communicate the "major" events in a baby's life - when she was thirsty, hungry, had an earache, or was ready to go to bed. She picked up on the gestures rather quick.
Eventually she started talking so we phased out the signs, but I really believe it's a great way to communicate with babies, rather than both mother and child being frustrated at not getting being able to get the point across. If we had another baby I'd start it earlier. - Kristen Smith, Mother of an 18 month old daughter

I never had problems when the girls were little and I mean NEVER! Everyone, from maternal to paternal side of the family were worried over nothing.  All of them actually thought signing would delay speech development when in fact, it enabled them to speak sooner than most! I'm *thrilled* you've started this! Just thrilled! - Heidi Feldman, Deaf Mother of two teenage girls

The biggest benefit in using sign language with my son is that I don't experience temper tantrums due to frustration.  He's able to tell me what he needs, when he needs it and I'm able to understand him. - Jennifer Honingsblum, Mother of a 16 month old son