A Valentine’s Day Message

All of a sudden it’s February, and with February come thoughts of Valentine’s Day, the one day of the year totally devoted to “love.” What a broad term that is! The Greeks identified many, many different types of love – from the love we feel for our soul mates, to the love we feel for our friends, to the love we feel for a beautiful sunset or favorite poem. But when it comes to love, we feel sure you’ll agree that there’s no deeper or more important emotion than the love we feel for our children. One of my favorite quotations from writer Elizabeth Stone makes this point exquisitely. To have children, she says, is “to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” 

We know from our own experiences that parenting children is both the most rewarding and most challenging job you will ever face. More than any other life-change, the sudden responsibility of having to steer a helpless infant through the murky waters and ever-shifting currents of modern life can seem overwhelming. And with good reason. The world is a vastly different place from the one we knew as children ourselves. As we struggle to raise our children while also dealing with unimaginable technologies, economic and political uncertainty, changing moral attitudes, and growing cultural diversity, it’s only natural to make mistakes along the way.

Fortunately, children don’t expect or need perfection from us. Children, even during the infant and toddler years, are flexible creatures with a capacity to forgive – just as long as the scale, overall, is very clearly weighted in a positive direction. It’s as though Mother Nature has realized that not the richest parent, not the most educated parent, not the most well-meaning parent in the world, can be expected to do a perfect job. What children do expect from us is unwavering love and devotion – through both the good and the hard times, through both the terrible two’s and the terrible teens! And that’s what we need to remember this Valentine season.

As you pause to reflect on the love you feel for your own children, we know you will appreciate the profound wisdom contained in these words from Lloyd deMause with which I close:

“The evolution of culture is ultimately determined by the amount of love, understanding and freedom experienced by its children... Every abandonment, every betrayal, every hateful act towards children returns tenfold a few decades later upon the historical stage, while every empathic act that helps a child become what he or she wants to become, every expression of love toward children heals society and moves it in unexpected, wondrous new directions.”

Happy Valentine’s Day—and Happy Signing!

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Potty Training: What About Cognitive Readiness?

I've started out this year with a series of postings about potty training, a topic we here at Baby Signs care about so strongly that we've created a potty training program that incorporates signing in order to make it possible to potty train children at earlier ages. In my last posting I pointed out that the American Academy of Pediatrics cites three factors as indicators that a child is “ready” for potty training: physical, cognitive, and emotional. In that post I focused on physical readiness, pointing to the fact that children used to routinely be trained by 18 months as clear evidence that children are physically ready much earlier than they are currently given credit for.

Today I’m taking a closer look at the second factor: cognitive readiness. According to the AAP, in order to actively participate in potty training, children must understand what it is they are supposed to do and be able to communicate about it. That is, be able to:
• Associate the need to eliminate with using the potty
• Understand simple instructions
• Signal an adult when they need to go

Again, the fact that children in the past were routinely trained by 18 months indicates that the first two of these abilities are both available quite early and certainly by 18 months.

As for signaling an adult, that’s easily dealt with through the use of simple signs! Just as children can learn to let their parents know when they feel the internal pangs of hunger, thirst, and even illness using simple signs like EAT, DRINK, MILK, MORE, and HURT, they can equally easily signal the urge to eliminate using a simple sign—POTTY. We’ve seen it work ourselves and have heard success stories from countless parents.

Bottom line? Using simple signs helps provide children the “cognitive readiness” they need to take an active role in potty training well before age 2.

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Potty Training: What Does “Ready” Really Mean?

Last week I talked about the trend toward later and later potty training and the role that the diaper industry has played in persuading parents that waiting is a good idea. After all, the longer children are in diapers, the more money they make! To help reverse this trend, we here at Baby Signs have developed a potty training program that uses signing to enable babies to signal the need to go long before they have words. In fact, our goal is to help parents get their children trained by age 24 – 30 months.

But are children “ready” that early? The question arises because parents frequently hear that it’s best to wait until a child is “ready” for potty training before beginning the process. But what exactly does the term “ready” mean? For the answer we turn to the American Academy of Pediatrics’ (AAP) Guide to Toilet Training (2003). According to the AAP, parents should watch for readiness in three specific developmental domains: physical, cognitive, and emotional. Over the next few postings, we’ll take a closer look at what’s required in each case starting with physical readiness.

According to the AAP, in order to actively participate in potty training, children must be physically able to:

• Sense when they need to eliminate
• Delay elimination long enough to get to the potty
• Sit independently on a potty chair

At what age do these skills typically appear? This is an easy question to answer based on the information about the history of potty training I described in my posting last week. If you’ve had a chance to read that entry you may remember the fact that before the invention of the disposable diaper in the early 1960s, children in the United States were routinely trained by 18 months! Is there any reason to suspect that children have changed so radically over the last 50 years that they’ve completely lost these physical abilities? Obviously not! If that was the norm up until the 1960s, then clearly children today are physically ready for potty training well before age 2.

In other words, it’s simply a cop out (as my son would say) to use a lack of “physical readiness” as an excuse to delay potty training until children are 3-years-old.

Stay tuned for discussion of cognitive and emotional “readiness.”

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Co-Founder, the Baby Signs Program
and
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis

Late Potty Training: Legacy of the Diaper Industry

Back in the 1980s when my children were young and not yet potty trained at 30 months, my mother-in-law would gently chastise me by saying that her kids were all trained by 18 months. At the time I thought that was pure exaggeration—the result of faulty memory or the desire to inspire me to get the kids trained. Now I know she was telling the absolute truth!

It turns out that before the 1960s children were routinely trained by 18 months—some estimates being as high as 95% of children. Given how distasteful and time-consuming it was to deal with the cloth diapers of the day, such an early age is understandable. Cloth diapers had to be rinsed out in the toilet, laundered in strong detergent and hot water, hung out to dry, folded and stacked—all steps that had to be repeated just a few days later. No wonder moms were eager to get their children out of diapers!

All this changed in the early 1960s with the invention of the disposable diaper. The good news was that their absorbency meant that babies stayed dryer and their ease of use meant that parents’ work was reduced. There was good news for the diaper industry’s bottom line, too, given the rapturous response parents had to this incredible new invention. It shouldn’t be a surprise, therefore, to hear that the industry began promoting the idea of later and later training.

By persuading both parents and pediatricians that later was better and by creating bigger and bigger diapers, the diaper industry has managed to move the average age of completion from younger than 18 months to over age 3—and still climbing! Most recently the industry introduced a size 7 diaper that can accommodate 6-year-old kids! And don’t let the name “pull-ups” fool you. They are simply disposable diapers in the shape of underpants.

The trend toward later and later training would be fine if it was good for children—but it’s not! It’s not good for children or their parents—and it’s definitely not good for the environment.

I’ll explain all this soon. Stay tuned. . . .

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Co-Founder, the Baby Signs Program
and
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis

Maternal Depression

This week I'm taking a detour from talking about sign language for babies in order to address a very important topic: Maternal depression. Research shows that mothers who suffer from depression for extended periods during a child’s early years put their children at greater risk for emotional problems. There are many reasons for this greater vulnerability. One of them is the fact that depressed mothers are much less likely to engage in the lively face-to-face interaction that is so critical to helping babies feel secure and loved during their first year.

We know that the absence of this kind of interaction is upsetting to babies because of research by Professor Ed Tronick. In his classic study called “the Still Face” experiment, he first filmed parents and infants interacting face to face in whatever way was normal for them. After a bit of time had passed, the parents were instructed to assume a totally frozen face—neither smiling nor scowling—and remain totally passive and unresponsive to any bids for attention from the baby. The result? Babies as young as 4 months turned out to be exquisitely sensitive to the disruption and quickly become despondent when the disruption continued for more than a moment or two. Interestingly, the babies seemed to understand when Mom turned away to talk to someone else; it was when there seemed to be no good reason for the disruption that they became disheartened. Under those conditions, they seemed to perceive their mother’s behavior as rejection, and with that perception came the fear that they had lost their hold on a safe and predictable world.

As Professor Tronick points out, if a momentary “still face” in the laboratory can cause a baby to become despondent, just think what happens when such rejection occurs on a daily basis. Human babies crave interaction, and when it’s missing for long periods of time and they feel powerless to restore it, they become depressed too.

The research on the dangers of maternal depression has been pivotal in directing attention to the phenomenon of post-partum depression, a biologically-based reaction to giving birth that used to be considered totally psychological—that is, the fault of the mother—and treated with advice that inevitably made these new moms feel more guilty and more depressed. Fortunately, doctors now understand that post-partum depression is a real and serious phenomenon that needs attention.

Professor Tronick’s work, therefore, provides a good example of how research investigating the intricacies of development and the parent-child relationship often has profoundly positive effects on the lives of babies and their parents. That's research money well spent!

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

A Cat by Any Other Name is Still a Cat…Sort Of

Every once in a while, I use my weekly blog to share stories that have come to us from parents who have enjoyed our Baby Signs® Program, each one illustrating how creatively babies use signs. The following story is another example, this time demonstrating that a baby’s use of signs often provides a window into how smart babies can be.

Sixteen-month-old Sara had learned a sign for CAT that involved stroking the back of one hand and arm with the opposite hand, all the way from finger tips to elbow. She used the sign a lot, her cat “radar” being in evidence as her mom read her books or took her for walks in the neighborhood. It’s amazing how many cats there are in the world once a toddler starts looking for them!

On one occasion, however, it wasn’t a full grown cat that caught her attention. In the local vet’s waiting room was a box with four kittens. These were the first kittens Sara had ever seen, and she was clearly fascinated. As usual, Sara turned to her mom to tell her, with a sign, what was in the box. But it wasn’t the usual CAT sign. Instead of a full swipe from finger tips to elbow, with a smile of wonder on her face, Sara substituted a tiny swipe just the length of her fingers. Her message? Big sign is to big cats as tiny sign is to tiny cats! In formal logic terms, an analogy!

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

New Year’s Resolution: Potty Time!

The new year is closing in on us and, if you’re like me, your mind is gravitating toward “New Year’s Resolutions.” (It’s a given that two of mine will be to exercise more and eat less—and this year I mean it!)

But as I let my mind drift back, it returns to a New Years over 20 years ago—1988 to be exact--when my son, Kai, was 2 ½ and I was facing (no, dreading!) the challenge of potty training. I had been asked by my mother-in-law over Christmas why he wasn’t trained yet and I told her he “wasn’t ready” and that my pediatrician had assured me that Kai would let me know when the time was right. But darn it, he seemed perfectly content to let things continue as they were! The problem with this was that I needed to enroll him in a new child care program more convenient to the university where I taught and they wouldn’t let him in unless he was out of diapers.

So, I made a New Year’s Resolution to start in the Spring. Ready or not, here I come—with the potty! By that time he was closing in on 3 and really not interested in wasting time using the potty when he could be playing and just using his diaper as he had been doing for the past 30 months. Problem was that the child care enrollment deadline was looming and he simply had to get trained!

Fortunately, the passage of time has dimmed my memory of the struggles that ensued (and there were struggles)—with one exception. I remember vividly promising the director of the child care center that he was, indeed, trained—and then feigning surprise when they would inform me that he had had an accident again. “Oh, I’m sure it’s the stress of starting a new school,” I lied. I’m not proud of myself for lying to them, but, like many parents before and since, I was desperate!

Since that time I’ve learned a lot about potty training, enough in fact, to feel comfortable creating a whole program designed to make it easier for parent and child alike to get potty training done by age 2. It's called The Baby Signs® Potty Training Program and has been successfully used by thousands of parents. The secret? It includes both step by step instructions for parents and fun things to inspire the little one to get on board with the enterprise. That's what "ready" means, after all--willingness to cooperate.

So, for those of you thinking about Potty Training in 2013, I urge you to do as I say and not as I did some 20 years ago. In other words, climb on board the "potty training" sooner rather than later!
Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Helping Kids Cope with Tragedy

Here we are in what should be a joyous celebration of the holiday seasons with hearts full of good cheer, and instead I find my thoughts returning time and again to the families of the children and teachers who were slaughtered in Connecticut last week. Anyone who has parented a child will find it almost impossible to imagine the horror that has engulfed that community.

My thoughts also, however, turn to the living—to parents all over the country who are wondering how to help their own children deal with what has happened. To this end, in this week’s blog I share some strategies experts have been posting this week. Much of this advice will serve equally well for national tragedies like the current one and scary situations closer to home--like accidents, robberies, fires, or natural disasters.

Let your child’s questions guide the discussion. This is especially true for very young children who may be surprisingly oblivious to what’s going on around them. In fact, sometimes parents are upset that their children are not upset! If you find yourself feeling that way, keep in mind that children’s worlds are very narrow and revolve almost exclusively around what affects them personally. Remember, the last thing you want to do is create anxiety where none exists!

Limit viewing of television coverage. Although it’s natural for adults to want their children to empathize with others’ suffering, resist the impulse to use the heartbreaking coverage of a tragedy to generate such feelings. All you may be creating is fear and sadness that make your child feel helpless. Look instead for ways to foster empathy that involve situations that are easy for a young child to understand--and remedy (e.g., another child is hurt, an animal is cold and hungry, a relative is feeling lonely).

Reassure your child that he/she is safe. This is obviously a very important goal. The term “reassure” is important because it reflects the reality that it is natural for children to be afraid. Don’t dismiss these fears. Listen carefully, let them talk, try to see if they have specific fears or a general anxiety. If there are specific fears—for example, that their classroom is not safe—talk about specific steps the school is taking to ensure their safety. Emphasize the availability of trustworthy adults both at school and at home.

Watch for changes in behavior. Anxiety can reveal itself in many ways besides just words. Be aware of changes in appetite, sleep patterns, acting out, clinging, etc. that seem to coincide with the external situation.

Review safety precautions. Doing so will be reassuring for both of you. Simply knowing the ABCs of what to do and what not to do (and why) will help ease anxiety.

While it’s true that we can’t protect our children forever from the suffering that life can bring, at least we can use steps like these to ease them into reality.


Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Tips for Keeping the Holidays Merry

(This week we have a guest author. The comments below were penned by a wonderful member of our Baby Signs staff, Bonita Broughton, as an article for one of our newsletters. Great advice worth sharing.)

A normal part of holiday activities for families includes visiting with friends and family. Many of these visitors are ones seldom seen by us throughout the year. Adults are often thrilled to see these faces and take joy in the experience. Children, however, can respond in a very different manner. For children, this experience can cause stress. They find themselves in unfamiliar places with unfamiliar faces and unfamiliar expectations. Helping your child prepare for holiday gatherings can help ward off some of the frustration that can arise for both parent and child.

Ideas for making gatherings successful:

Photo Time: Take some time prior to the gathering to look through old photos of the people you will be seeing. Try to find pictures which include the child as well. If your child uses signs for specific family members, use the signs to help make the connection between the person and the photo.

The Hand-off: Enthusiastic family members will be excited to see your little one and may immediately reach to take your child. Some children are fine with this and just need you to stay close until they are passed back. Other children will not have such a favorable response. Be prepared to take the lead by saying something like, "He takes a while to warm up, but he really likes for you to give a high-five." If your little one is signing, then you can encourage him with simple signs like GOOD JOB or I LOVE YOU. Don't forget to remind your child of the pictures you looked at and use the sign if appropriate.

It is moving time: One concern can be decorations placed down low. Even for the most well-behaved child, twinkling lights and shiny objects can be a strong temptation! Gently ask the host if you can move the item to a higher location. This can prevent you, your child, and the host a lot of unneeded stress. If it is not something that can be moved, use signs LIKE GENTLE, WAIT, STOP, and THANK YOU to help guide the child's behavior.

It’s in the Bag: With all the hustle and bustle of the season parents often forget to bring items to keep the little one busy. Simple toys, puzzles, and books can give the child a familiar item for comfort and provide some much needed distraction. Bringing a book with easy to sign words can also offer the child a chance to share her signing success with family members and help to get new family members onboard with your signing efforts.

Keep these tips from Bonita in mind as you look enjoy your holiday celebrations and the chance of adding happy memories to your scrapbook will definitely increase.

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Baby Sign Language in Action!

One of my favorite topics for this blog is describing how creative babies are in their use of signs. While it’s true that they use them effectively for routine needs, like more food or drink or being “all done,” these are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the ways that babies communicate with signs. Here are some stories that illustrate my point.

• Baby Aubrey’s mom wrote to us about how Aubrey used the signs for COLD and OUTSIDE when her mother opened the door to let the dog out and used them again—along with an emphatic shake of the head for NO—when her mom started to put Aubrey’s coat on to leave the house.

• Here’s another story where a dog played a prominent role. Henry’s mom told us how Henry came to her and signed DOG plus DRINK—and sure enough, the dog’s water bowl was empty.

• I particularly like the creativity shown in the following story. The signs for FLY (actually, BUG) and WATER came in handy for a 16-month-old when she wanted to play with a common utensil—the “fly-swatter!”

• And then there’s little Julia who, upon seeing a mom wearing a front pack with her baby’s arms and legs hanging out and head peeping out the top, got a quizzical look on her face and signed TURTLE!

Over the years I’ve learned that many people don’t “get it” about baby sign language until they hear stories like this. What a wonderful way to show people unfamiliar with babies that there truly is “somebody home in there!”

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

How Would You Feel If….

Over the years, I’ve learned that challenging a parent’s reaction to his or her child’s behavior is a delicate matter. One strategy that has worked for me is what I call the “How would you feel if…” technique. Essentially, the idea is to describe a situation analogous to the child’s but where the parent is in the spotlight. Here’s an example from my book about emotional development (with Dr. Susan Goodwyn), Baby Hearts, dealing with a parent’s angry and humiliating reaction to his son’s fear of a dog.

Max, the neighbor’s overly friendly Labrador retriever, lopes toward 2-year-old Timmy who quickly takes shelter behind his dad’s leg and begins to cry. His dad, Jim, following in the footsteps of generations of dads with sons, says, “Don’t be such a scaredy-cat. He’s not going to hurt you!” Do those words help? No. In fact, research shows that sympathizing with a child’s fears is an important ingredient in the recipe for creating empathy. Perhaps the next scenario might make that dad react differently.

New York City born and bred, Jim decides to take Timmy and the rest of his family to Idaho for an exciting week on a “Dude Ranch.” While his family is still eating breakfast, Jim wanders out to the corral. As he approaches the gate, it suddenly swings open and a large horse comes bounding out of the gate toward him. Jim jumps back quickly, slips, and finds himself in the dirt looking up as the horse races by, leaving him in a cloud of dust. As Jim lies in the dirt, shocked and shaken, the resident cowboy comes sauntering out and drawls, “Hey, city boy, don’t be such a scaredy -cat. He ain’t gonna hurt you!” Jim pulls himself up and stumbles back to the house--humiliated, angry, and feeling he had every right to be frightened given the horse was so large and unknown to him.

We can only hope that parents like Jim make the connection!

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

A Sign of Thanks for Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, is just a few days away. I love it because it’s an opportunity to gather with family, eat great food, and say “Thanks” for the many blessings we enjoy—including one another. Here’s a great story about how the ability of a baby to sign made Thanksgiving dinner extra sweet for one family. It comes from a former student of mine, Stella, at UC Davis.

Stella and her parents traveled to Chicago to share Thanksgiving with her sister, brother-in-law, and 3 kids—including 15-month-old Kayla, a graduate of our Baby Signs classes. Once everyone was seated at the table, Stella’s dad said a short grace and stood up to carve the turkey. Suddenly Kayla squealed and began to excitedly sign “apple.” Despite being offered some applesauce, Kayla kept repeating the sign even more determinedly. Finally, seemingly out of frustration, Kayla added a second sign—“Thank you” to her “apple” sign. It was then that her mom figured it out. At dinner time at Kayla’s house, instead of saying grace at the table, the tradition was to hold hands and sing the “Johnny Appleseed” song—the one where you “thank the Lord” for “the sun and the rain and the apple seed.” Kayla clearly felt that her grandfather’s grace wasn’t good enough! Once everyone held hands and sang the song with real gusto, Kayla was satisfied and settled down to eat—no doubt saying a silent “thanks” that she’d finally gotten her message across!

Helping children learn to be truly thankful for the blessings in their lives is a challenge that every parent faces. Teaching the sign for “thank you” (fingertips moving in an arching motion outward from the chin) is a great way to get it started at a remarkably early age. And what better time to start than Thanksgiving!

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to follow us on Facebook)!

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs Program

It’s Not Just for Babies Anymore

Although the federally-funded research Dr. Susan Goodwyn and I conducted was focused on documenting the benefits of signing with hearing infants and toddlers, it’s increasingly clear that signing also has benefits for older children. We hear this especially from teachers who have introduced signing into their preschool and early elementary school classrooms. Here are some of the benefits cited most frequently.

• Gives language delayed kids a way to communicate. As Speech/Language Pathologists can attest, a significant proportion of children lag behind their peers in their ability to verbalize their thoughts. For these children, having signs available to communicate can help relieve tremendous amounts of frustration and anger.

• Provides another modality to give instructions—esp. helpful in stressful situations. Even children who, under normal conditions, understand what is said to them, can become immune to verbal instructions when tension levels are high. It’s almost like their accelerated heart rates plug up their ears with competing sounds! In such situations, a highly visible sign made by the adult can work wonders by both grabbing their attention and reinforcing the verbal message (like “Stop!” “Wait!” “Gentle!” or “Sit Down!”).

• Gives children an alternative physical action. Even preschoolers, when frustrated, often act out in anger—pushing or shoving their peers. Providing them with the physical action required to produce a sign (like “Stop!” or “No!”) helps release this tension while at the same time sending a clear message to the offending chum.

• Allows teachers and children to communicate quietly & from a distance. Sometimes words are either not appropriate or not effective. A child who, during nap time, can signal “Potty” to the teacher, or the teacher who can signal “Sit down” or “Listen” to a restless child in a group, can get his/her message across quite easily.

• Enables communication with and by special needs children. As more and more special needs children are being mainstreamed in classrooms and activities, how wonderful to have a way for the two groups of kids to be able to communicate!

• Promotes appreciation of the Deaf Community. Learning simple signs is a great way to acquaint young children with the challenges faced by individuals who can’t hear as well as the richness of the wonderful solution they’ve devised to deal with that challenge—sign language..

• Older kids think it’s fun! Kids of all ages are intrigued by sign language and love the idea of an alternative to words. Signs are like a “secret codes, something that kids have always found fascinating.

So, although we will continue to call our program “The BABY Signs® Program,” there’s no doubt that it’s not just for little ones anymore!

Visit www.babysigns.com for more information about Baby Signs® resources to help you and your baby enjoy all the benefits that signing can bring.

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to visit us on Facebook)!

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

How Little Hands Can Help

Back in August, as a break from writing about baby sign language, I wrote about the idea of “chores” for young children. The point I made there was that it’s the smart parent who takes advantage of the toddler’s natural desire to “help” by letting him or her do so and then consciously rewarding even feeble efforts in that direction. The goal is to get young children in the habit of cooperating.

There are lots of advantages to having young children help out besides the (sometimes marginal) benefit of not having to do all the work yourself. Having children contribute to the work of a household teaches them a wide variety of valuable lessons:

• Keeps them from feeling entitled to be waited on.
• Makes them aware of how much work it is to keep a household functioning, thereby making them more appreciative of the contributions of others.
• Makes them feel part of the family “team.”
• Teaches specific skills (e.g., carrying dishes carefully, sorting clothes, etc.)
• Strengthens self-esteem by eliciting praise from parents.

But, you may be thinking, can really little ones actually do? Here are some ideas:
• Use a hand vacuum or small broom to clean up crumbs (see photo!)
• Add water and food to pet bowls
• Water plants outside (with a watering can or spray bottle)
• Help you move wet clothes from the washer to the dryer
• Put newspapers in the recycle container
• Transfer groceries from bags to a shelf or table.
• Put placemats on the table and napkins at each place (and maybe silverward)
• Carry dishes (a few at a time) to the kitchen
• Pull blankets up neatly on their beds and tuck pajamas away
• Exercise the dog by playing fetch with ball, stick, or frisbee

And of course, the old favorite, put their toys away at bedtime!

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to visit us on Facebook)!

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program

Troublesome “Tips”

A parent forwarded to me postings from a blog about signing with babies (www.babysignlanguagenow.com) that has been popping up frequently in Google “Alerts.” I’m usually delighted to see increased dissemination of information about the topic; the more parents we can reach the better! In this case, however, the specific advice offered is in so many instances contrary to our own observations here at Baby Signs about what works—as well as contrary to good developmental practice—that I felt it would be important to point out our concerns by highlighting the post entitled “When Baby Signs Back: Factors that Affect.”

Question posed: Why are there individual differences in how long it takes for a baby to start signing back? (“…how long [before] their baby [will] sign back.”)

(1). “Those babies who have better IQ are more likely to learn different signs earlier in life. So, the general rule is the stronger the mental capabilities of your baby are, the earlier he will sign back to you.”

CONCERN: There is no data that supports such an assertion. Nor could there be given all the factors totally unrelated to mental ability that we know contribute: (a) Individual differences in the priority babies have for communicating are really important. For example, some babies would rather climb the bookshelves than read the books. (b) Age: The younger the baby is when you start modeling signs, the longer it will take. (c) How much signing the child sees.

(2). “The earlier you start teaching sign language, the earlier you get results. The recommended age to start teaching baby sign language is 4 months.”

CONCERN: If the question is, as the beginning of the post states, how long before a baby begins signing back, the answer is the younger the baby, the longer it will take. There’s certainly nothing wrong with starting early. However, the chance that a parent will get discouraged and quit is greater. That’s why we suggest between 9 and 12 months.

(3) “The more dedication you show, the more organized your teaching is, the more chances that your baby will learn baby sign language earlier in life.

CONCERN: Although this sounds like our point about the amount of signing a baby sees, the bit about organized teaching implies the importance of specific lesson times. In fact, in another posting, the author calls for “teaching sessions” where you try to “eliminate all the distractions around you” including “random noises and other persons” and rewarding the baby “with food and toys whenever he takes a successful step in the process of learning baby sign language.” In sharp contrast, our 30 years of observation and research indicate that simply incorporating signs into everyday routines and activities with your baby is the best way to go. Regimented lesson times in isolation from others, in fact, can be off-putting and counter-productive—and an excited reaction by Mom or Dad is usually reward enough! You’re not teaching a dog to roll over.

(4) “Whether it is a matter of lack of nutrition or encouragement, anything that hampers the mental development of your baby will also slow down the learning process.”

CONCERN: Of course, anything truly injurious to a child’s physical or psychological welfare will affect the child’s developmental timeline in a wide variety of domains. However, most parents who consult a blog like this already know that nutrition and encouragement are important. And the downside to the statement is the focus, once again, on “mental capabilities.”

This list covers just one of the postings. The others have problems, too--like the advice to “use flash cards to show the babies the proper ways to sign” as if babies could learn from a static image better than a real life demonstration!

After three full decades observing and conducting research on the topic of signing with babies, I feel so passionate about it that I think it’s important to set the record straight when parents are being led astray. The last thing we need is for the movement to get a bad reputation from an influx of really bad advice.

Happy Signing (and don’t forget to visit us on Facebook)!

Linda

Linda Acredolo, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, UC Davis
and
Co-Founder, The Baby Signs® Program