Treasure Tuesday

After the stress, exhaustion, and emotional toll from last week I figured I needed to do something lighthearted for my Treasure Today!

It's also something I've mentioned a few times before...something that has been huge in our household for communication!

Signing Time!

Before Kayla was born we had talked about doing sign language to help bridge that communication gap before a toddler learns to speak; we were planning on doing this before we even knew about the possibility of Down syndrome. So when she was born it became even more important to us to learn ASL to help Kayla communicate (since most kids with Ds have a speech delay).

We soon found out about these awsome signing videos and it seemed everywhere I went on the internet there were rave reviews about these DVDs. The mom who started these DVDs found out her daughter was deaf at about 18 months. She wanted to teach ASL to hearing children so they could communicate with her child. We bought the first DVD and were so impressed with it we got the whole set (at the time there were only 6 volumes!) Now we own all 13 volumes!

I remember the first time Kayla signed "eat" - we had been doing the sign with her for months and sometimes it seemed like she was signing back, but we just weren't sure. She was around 13 months when she did it the first time pretty clearly. She had woken up that morning, I had her on the changing table asking if she wanted to go "eat" (signing the word while saying it as well) and all of a sudden she did it back to me...I can't express how excited I was to see that! So we ran into the kitchen so I could give her some cheerios. She started doing it multiple times throughout the day and I didn't know if she was actually hungry, or doing it because it was something new and she got a reaction out of me (I'm sure it was the latter!) but I wanted to reinforce what she was doing so I would give her cheerios each time.

She would eventually start to pick up new signs every week; not always initiating the sign herself, usually after we would say a word/sign first. But one day when she was 20 months old we were in line at the commissary. She was sitting in the cart and all of a sudden signed the word "dog" ... I looked at her quizzically not sure why she was signing that word in the grocery store. I started to glance around and there to my left I noticed a display of dog food which has pictures of dogs all over the bag! I can not tell you how proud of her I was at that moment! I wanted to shout and jump up and down in that line! I told her in an excited voice, "yes Kayla that IS a doggie!" I got home and had to call Joe immediately at work. She recognized the animal and did the sign on her own.

She's able to sign well over 100 words, but she's slowly starting to drop some of the signs as she says the words now, but it's been so wonderful watching her making the connection between a sign and a word/object and being able to communicate with us that way.

These DVDs made learning ASL fun - for the whole family! Joe and I had to learn right along with Kayla. And I'm not too embarassed to admit that Joe and I sing all the songs on the DVDs when they are on; they are so catchy! I know I'm not the only one out there singing more than just "It's signing time with Alex and Leah..." !!

Here is a picture I posted back from Easter when she got the latest set in her basket: