Has anyone tried baby sign language with bilingual children?

[NewYorkMom_får_to_tette]

We are having our first baby in July, and my husband (American) will speak English to him while I will speak Norwegian. We may also spend some time in Germany next year, so in his first year of life he will be exposed to three different languages.

 

I'd also be interested in trying baby sign language with him to give him a way to communicate prior to learning to speak. (For those not familiar with this concept, it basically involves teaching the baby a few hand signals that are used frequently--for example the words for "more, milk, sleep, hurt, etc. Children usually learn to communicate in this way long before they start speaking.) I'd be interested in knowing whether doing this would help a bilingual child to associate the two languages; for example understanding that when daddy says "more" and mommy says "mer" they make the same hand signal..and this would enforce the concept of words having the same meaning in two languages. Any bilingual families out there using baby signs?

[Smoopster]

I am Norwegian and my husband is American. Our daugther (now almost 3 years old) was born when we lived in California.

 

We started using sign language with her when she was 7-8 months old. We were recommended to use ASL (american sign language) and not one of those made up baby sign languages. I bought a small book with the most useful signs for babies. Like: more, all done, sleep, milk etc. She learned the signs long before the words, so I would really recommend trying to teach the baby sign language.

 

We now live in Norway. I speak Norwegian to her and her dad speaks english. She mostly responds to him in Norwegian, but she understands everything he says in english. According to helsesøster and barnehagen, her language is more developed than most kids her age, so I don't think being bilingual always make them learn languages later like some research suggests.

[Chunky81]

Hi,

Do you remember the name of the book, or publisher?

We live in Norway (i'm norwegian and he is american) and it will be a great gift from the grandparents to be who lives in the US.

[Smoopster]

We used a simple book called "Baby Sign Language Basics"

by Monta Briant

 

http://www.amazon.com/Baby-Language-Basics-House-Lifestyles/dp/1401902901/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/103-6606744-1757466?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174889236&sr=1-2