Baby Sign Language Basics

I truly credit teaching my daughter baby sign language (and tons of reading!) for her rapid linguistic development, communication skills (aka LESS tantrums and meltdowns), and ability to speak in full sentences by 2 years old.

[Related Post: “Baby’s First Library: Birth to 12 Months Old“]

In this post, I will be going through the when, how and what of teaching your baby their first sign language.

While there are no particular scientific support to suggest that sign language accelerates linguistic development, I found teaching sign language to my daughter helped me immensely with communicating and understanding my daughter’s needs.

Building trust and bond between you and your child takes time and consistency. Every time you meet your child’s needs quickly and correctly (i.e., she is crying because she is hungry, and you feed her), she will learn to trust the care taker in her life to help her in this world.

Young children NEED this attachment and sense of security to develop into curious, confident individuals. It might seem counterintuitive, but letting your child “Cry It Out”, or imposing time-outs or punitive actions for “difficult” behaviour is NOT going to teach them independence. Instead, these frustrated reactions from the parent are going to prevent your child from connecting with you and learning new skills.

[Related Post: “10 Toddler Discipline Methods for Happier Kids and Happier Parents“]

Do I need to know sign language before teaching my child?

No. I have no background in sign language or any professional linguistic teaching and I was able to pick these signs up quickly and implement them.

I literally learned as I went, sometimes learning a sign right before teaching it to my daughter.

I did not take any classes, virtual or in-person before I taught my daughter sign language.

There are tons of free resources on Youtube if you’d like to watch and learn, but remember, the MOST important point of teaching your baby sign language is that YOU and YOUR CHILD understand your 2-way communication, and what you’re trying to say.

It doesn’t matter if the signs aren’t perfect!

What if my child is non-verbal and over the age of 2?

Think of baby sign language is a true language. It helps with communicating your child’s needs and wants, and it is another way for your to build your bond.

I don’t think it is ever too late to teach your child sign language. Almost all of these signs are actual ASL (American Sign Language), which is a great lifelong skills to have!

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When to Start Baby Sign Language

I recommend starting around 5-6 months old. While your baby cannot sign back at this age, they are soaking it all in. My daughter did not sign back until about 10 months old.

Babies are able to understanding skills before they can use verbal skills.

I like to start incorporating more consistent sign language when my daughter is starting solids. By this time, you’re likely out of the dreaded 4 month sleep regression, and you’re likely more able to implement some sort of a routine in your day.

At birth, your baby has 100 billion neurons which is almost all the neurons that the brain will ever have. As the neurons mature, more connections between the brain cells (called “synapses“) are made, and these connections go from 2,500 per neuron at birth to almost 15,000 per neuron by age 2 or 3.

The brain will eliminate the connections (called “pruning”) of that are seldom or not used at all.

There are “windows of opportunity” where hypersensitive learning can take place. This starts between month 2 to 4, and peaking in intensity at 8 months.

Teaching your baby sign language will not only help your baby communicate, but also develop the ability to further build on their language capabilities and understanding of the world as they grow.

Source: University of Maine

I have found that the daycare facility that my daughter is going to also utilize sign language for baby class. Teaching baby sign language early will not only help you communicate with your baby, but also others who will be taking care of them!

How to Teach Baby to Sign

Repetition, repetition, repetition!!!

Repetitions are SO important. Repetitions strengthen the connection (synapses) in the brain from the visual sign to what the sign means, and prevents it from being pruned away. The rapid firing neurons and the rapid pruning process that happen in the brain helps your baby learn quickly, but also forget quickly if it is not repeated!

Teaching any language is best under the right context. I recommend to sign to baby when the word comes up naturally, and not force it randomly.

Baby sign language made easy with 4 key elements:

1. Obvious: holding your hand(s) to your baby’s face, your eyes looking at your child and back at your hand, letting her know that you are trying to get her attention to the gestures. Use slightly exaggerated facial expressions while you say and do these actions to convey your emotion and the word you are mouthing.
2. Easy: adapt difficult sign language to their stage. In the beginning, instead of using intricate finger placements, focus on the general motion. For example: use both hands to pat on chest instead of using the thumbs up on a flat hand for the word “help“. This is also known as sign approximation. As long as both of you have a “sign” for a word, that is success!
3. Connect: link the context of why you are signing and what you are naming. Do this clearly by motioning with a sign (sometimes pointing to the item first) AND verbally naming the object or action. For example: if signing an object like a “ball”, you can point to the ball, verbally name it “ball”, and sign with your hands to indicate you are connecting the sign to the word.
4. Reinforce: repeat verbally what you have signed in action. Repeat the motion multiple times in the same context. Any time the same word or action comes up, you can repeat the sign to reinforce the learning. Repetitions will form the procedural memory, semantic memory, working memory and episodic memory required to recall the sign and use it in the right context.

What Baby Signs to Teach

You really DO NOT need to learn 101 baby signs to start teaching your child. Being too ambitious in teaching too many words from the get-go will be exhausting for you and too much for your child to retain (key word again is repetition).

I recommend starting in the following chronological order, also corresponding to what you and your baby might be doing together during these months. I recommend focusing on functional and high frequency words.

You can check out my resources section below to find the visual representations of these words. I’ll be putting the context/scenarios beside each word and when best to introduce them.

6 Months – 10 Months

1. Milk: before a feed.
2. All Done: whenever a meal is done, later when done with an activity.
3. More: when your baby finished their plate, show them more food and sign before giving the food.
4. Diaper / Change: before a diaper change.
5. Bath: before a bath in the washroom (to provide context).
6. Sleep / Bed: when baby is showing sleepy cues and you are about to start the sleeping routine.
7. Help: whenever you see your baby struggling for a while (it’s fine to let them struggle for a little bit!)
8. Book: before you are reading the book, in front of books.
9. Eat: before eating solids, easiest to introduce when baby is starting Baby Led Weaning to differentiate between milk.
10. Drink: before introducing a cup to drink from.

10 months – 12 months

1. Yes: this is likely naturally introduced as you speak to your child. Make this a two way communication by letting them know after you ask them action word.
2. No: this is likely naturally introduced as you speak to your child. Make this a two way communication by letting them know after you ask them action word.
3. Play: when baby is more mobile, as part of their daily routine.
4. Hi: whenever you see people.
5. Want: whenever something is out of reach for your baby and you can see that. I use “help” to ask afterwards, and this connects 2 words into a logical “sentence”.
6. Please: connect this with “want”, babies understand this concept of manners and pleasantries surprisingly earlier than I thought.
7. Sorry: whenever there are accidents and they are hurt/surprised is a good time to introduce this word. Utilize facial expressions at the same time.
8. Thank You: whenever your child hands you something.
9. Water: once they are able to differentiate between “milk” and “drink”, you can introduce water as a more specific word.
10. Hurt: whenever the child gets hurt.

Resources for Baby Sign Language

Flashcards and Books

Youtube Channels and Videos

Please note the videos below are NOT mine, and all credit goes to the original creators.

These are the videos that I watched to help me get started in learning more about baby sign language and how to do them properly. There are TONS of videos on Youtube, so I highly encourage you to watch a few videos to get acquainted with the different signs and some of the adapted variations for early learners.

• Should you start signing to your baby? Emma Hubbard’s video go through more “Truth About Baby Sign Language (Facts Every Parent Should Know)”
• I’ve linked Learn With Adrienne‘s channel before in this post, and this is a great channel to learn how to read and speak to your baby which are important skills for parents to simultaneously implement while teaching baby sign language.

This post was all about baby sign language basics to help you get started on teaching your child how to sign and communicate with you.

I highly recommend you to look into starting the baby sign language journey with your child. It has helped me tremendously for not getting frustrated or feeling helpless when my daughter is crying and not knowing what to do as a first time mom. It also helps now that we have second daughter, and she can communicate with her sister easily and effectively as she grows!

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