Ahhh...I bet title of this blog post drew you in, but I'll get to that later...
Ok, let's face it, it's not uncommon for twins to experience speech delays. I know my first-born daughter, Naomi, was chatting up a storm at almost 22 months, so I'm very aware that my dynamic duo are are bit behind compared to their singleton peers. It may be due to the fact that their overly-enthusiastic big sister does all the speaking for them (“Mommy, Lilli needs a new diaper!”) , or that they aren't getting enough one-on-one time interaction with me (Preschooler + toddler twins = survival mode). Or perhaps my toddlers can communicate with each other in some kind of secret language, so who needs verbal skills anyway?
However, there is one way to make your life much easier without requiring your little ones to actually be able to “speak” to you and that's by using sign language. As starry-eyed new parents wanting to communicate right away with our first baby, we started signing when she was about 4 months old and by 6 months, Naomi was already signing back the ever-important gesture, “milk”. Over the course of a year, she probably mastered about 80 signs, including many she made up herself. I cannot stress how AWESOME and HELPFUL it is to have a 6 month old baby be able to communicate some basic needs such as “milk”, “eat” and “more”. Signing completely empowered her and from an early age, she learned that she could communicate with us to get her needs met, which definitely reduced frustration levels for all of us! (This means fewer meltdowns since she could tell us when she was hungry, tired, etc. instead of just grunting...or worse, screaming and crying.) As Naomi got older, signing became an amusing way to entertain people, as she would show people how to sign such esoteric things as “penguin” and “shrimp”. It should also be noted, she turned into a major talker, a constant chatterbox (much to my chagrin, especially during long car trips), so don't let anyone tell you that signing causes delayed speech, because that's completely untrue.
Sadly, my husband and I haven't been as diligent at signing with Elise and Lilli (uhhh...can you say time
contraints?), but because we completely realize what an invaluable communication tool it is, we MADE SURE that we taught them at least the basics: milk, more, eat, bath, book, and the girls' favorite sign, play. You can imagine my joy several months back when I asked my then non-talking Elise why she was being so fussy and she signed “more” and “sleep”. So, into the crib she went without any fuss at all!
“Ok, Mari, I'm convinced!”, you say. “I want my twins to tell me that they want to go to bed.” (Seriously, how utterly PRICELESS would that be?) So what's the next step. Well, I'm glad you asked! I hope that you will scoop up your babies or toddlers and join us for this weeks upcoming New and Expectant meeting on “Signing with Your Baby”. We have an amazing speaker, Ms. Ramona Snyder, mom and owner of her own sign language business, Signs for Little Hands. Ramona holds a Masters degree in Special Education with an emphasis in deaf education and obtained her teaching credential in deaf education from San Jose State University in 2001. A light meal will be provided.
Gemini Crickets NEP Meeting Details
Wed Oct 14, 2009
6:15–7:15 pm
Saratoga Library
13650 Saratoga Ave, Saratoga CA 95070
Original post to Mad About Multiples.
