[sozobe]

Aw. Lots of creative kids!

One thing I wanted to get in there -- while there is certainly nothing wrong with made-up signs ("home signs"), and a lot that is great about it, it is not the equivalent to ASL. ASL signs have liguistic commonalities, the manual equivalent of phonemes (the building blocks of language), and lots of other good linguistic stuff that has been shown to aid in general language development.

(meister, that's the sign for "show" or "show me." That's also the "real" sign for toothbrush, though!

Phoebe, the sign for "stuck" is to make a V or peace sign

and then gently bounce it against against your larynx (or a bit higher). That with an appropriate expression (brows furrowed.) That was one of my dd's first signs and she used it a lot! (Still does.)

 

[sozobe]

Hi nappyhair,

Yep, my daughter is bilingual. She is currently a little chatterbox, and also signs pretty much whatever she wants to. (1,000 signs? A guess.)

 

[sozobe]

Hi nappyhair,

Yep, I'm bilingual too, since before dd -- I became deaf as a teenager. English is my first language, ASL my second.

I think (hearing children of hearing parents) are most motivated to sign when that is THE way for them to communicate. When they can communicate as easily or even more easily by talking, there is less motivation to sign.

I do lipread, and my husband is hearing, so my daughter speaks a great deal. (Today at dinner she said, "I want a pet, but not an ordinary pet... I want a cat with beautiful long white fur." -- word for word transcription.

) I am in a tricky stage now where I don't want to pressure her to sign, but do prefer that she signs more than she currently does. The main thing that I've found helps is to sign MYSELF as often as possible, especially in fun ways like storytelling or having "secret" conversations at a restaurant.

That's so cool that your kids might be tri-lingual!

Very brief rant which I already mostly covered in the above post -- it took so long for ASL to be recognized as a real language, and in that context it makes me wince a little bit when it as seen as interchangeable with homesigns (made-up signs.) One is a language, a real language, one is not. That doesn't mean that there is anything wrong with home signs, really, just that they are another kettle of fish.