Whether your baby is starting with purees, or diving right in to some delicious fingers foods, fruit is probably on the menu.
If you’re just starting out, you don’t need to learn the sign for every single food your baby eats – in fact, simply signing “eat” is a great place to start.
But as your baby begins to show preferences for certain foods, or even develops a clear favorite, you’ll want to teach your baby the sign for that special treat.
Sweet, juicy fruits are popular faves for babies, so watch through the below video and see if there are any your little one might want to learn. That way they can let you know what they want!
In today’s video you’ll learn how to sign APPLE, BANANA, PEAR, STRAWBERRY, BLUEBERRY, MELON, WATERMELON, PINEAPPLE, COCONUT, and ORANGE.
Baby Sign Language (ASL) Signs for Fruits
Bonus: Free Printable!
I’ve also created a FREE printable guide that you can keep as a reference to help you remember how to do a few of these signs.
If you already get email updates from me, the link to download the printable was in your email. If you are not yet on the Tiny Signs list, please sign up for immediate access to this free PDF guide.
Many times each day, your baby will need your help with something – they are hungry, tired, wet, uncomfortable or frustrated. Babies usually let us know they need something by vocalizing and even crying. As parents, we want to be responsive to our baby’s needs so that they will be happy and trust that we are there to care for them.
When your baby starts rolling, crawling and exploring their world…that’s when things get interesting! As baby’s interest in the world grows, so do the opportunities for frustration! There are so many things they want to touch, taste and explore – and sometime things don’t go the way they’d like because of their still developing motor skills.
When your baby can’t reach the thing they want, or something they are trying to get their hands on is stuck, they will likely SHRIEK in frustration and to let you know they need your help. When this happens, it is an excellent time to introduce the sign for “help.”
To teach your baby the sign for “help,” ask them “do you need HELP?” And sign “help” as you say the word. Watch the video below to learn how to do the sign correctly. Then help your little one solve the problem and and reinforce the sign again by saying, “mama HELPED (demonstrate the sign again) you, now you have the toy!” Continue to model the sign whenever opportunities arise and in time your baby will sign “help” to you when they need you!
Want to learn more signs to teach your baby?
Click the image below to have a FREE baby sign language chart delivered straight to your inbox!
Things That GO! :: Baby Sign Language for Vehicles
Babies & toddlers love things that go! Cars, trains & planes are fascinating to look at and make interesting sounds. Your young toddler might have a little ride-on toy that looks like a bus or tricycle, or maybe he’s fascinated with fire engines and police cars. Or maybe you’ve got a little one who looooves tractors. If this sounds like your little one, you’re going to love this video and free printable!
In this baby sign language video I’m excited to share with you a few of my favorite American Sign Language signs that you can use to teach your baby signs for things that GO! You can use these when you’re playing with toys, reading a book (see my favorites below!), or pointing out vehicles when you’re out & about.
Have Fun Learning Transportation Signs!
In this video, learn the American Sign Language (ASL) signs for CAR, BICYCLE, AIRPLANE and BOAT!
Vehicle Signs
Bonus! Free Printable…
I’ve also created a FREE printable guide that you can keep as a reference to help you remember how to do these four signs.
Great Board Books for Teaching Your Baby Signs for Vehicles
Books are a great way to teach your baby sign language. Here is a list of some of my favorite board books about vehicles:
An Antidote to Helplessness—Melissa’s Baby Sign Language Story
Melissa works full-time outside the home as a clinical psychologist with a focus on trauma. She is a first-time mama to her son Max (13 months), who she is absolutely crazy about and falls more in love with each day. Melissa is extremely grateful for Max and his ebullient, loving, resilient and generous spirit; he inspires her to approach life with more awe, humor, and kindness every day.
How We Started Baby Sign Language
I have always been fascinated by the use of sign language, and baby sign language was one of the early ways I communicated with Max.
We started communicating when he was in utero. The first time I heard Max’s heartbeat, it was like he was telling me, “Don’t worry mama. . . . I may not move that much, but I’m doing just fine in here.” Every time he moved, it felt like communication.
When Max was around 6 or 7 weeks old, he would coo and pause. I would talk back, and then he would coo in response. It felt like a conversation.
Then we started signing. The first sign we recognized in Max was fan at the age of 10 months. In retrospect, I realize he had been signing all done even before that. There were times we thought he was swatting us away (especially when we were giving him medications), when he was actually signing and articulating his desire to be all done.
Baby Signing Success
I was excited at first about signing. As time went on with him not responding, I worried I would have the first baby who never signed back. That worry was tied to my concerns about his cognitive development secondary to feeding issues and slow weight gain. Despite that worry, signing turned out to be a saving grace.
When Max was just a few months old he would regularly be in intense pain, and each week he continued to decrease percentiles in weight and height. Eventually, his GI distress got so intense that his discomfort was undeniable.
In the hospital
Several specialists, medical procedures, feeding therapy appointments, and inpatient hospitalizations later, we ended up with a feeding tube. It helped our child grow but it felt so unnatural. I was on a strict allergen-free elimination diet, I was pumping 7–8 times per day so that my breast milk could be put into the tube, we were dosing him with several meds several times per day, and we were waking up throughout the night to tend to his distress and issues with the pump.
Practicing signing with Max gave us a respite from all of that—something fun and positive to focus on that continued cultivating our relationship and that had nothing to do with feeding issues. And when Max finally did start signing back, we felt pride, success, and accomplishment in what had been such a long road of confusion, questions, and mistakes.
Once Max picked up a few signs, it wasn’t long until there was a sign language explosion! I went from thinking Max would never sign to feeling like I can hardly keep up with learning new signs to teach him. I am telling others about his signs and making videos of signs and his approximations so others can support him.
Signing was something we did together in the midst of something chaotic and terrible, so it helped us to see how resilient we truly are as a family. Max’s signing reassured me that we were all going to be okay.
Signing has helped Max understand what we are saying more fully, in both English and Spanish, even if he doesn’t have the signing or verbal vocabulary to respond. At 13 months he’s signing fan, all done, light, book, more, dog, orange, stick,milk, and up, and verbally he says hi, bye-bye, up, ball, and book. We’re constantly trying to figure out more that he’ll be motivated to use. It’s such a thrill to see him beam with pride and excitement as he communicates and is understood.
Max Signs “fan!”
Baby Signing Challenges and Surprises
I’ve been surprised by abstract signs like more. That was one he signed very quickly. I thought he was confusing it with cherries because the first time he signed it was in the presence of cherries. But he actually understood what it meant and had generalized it to other contexts.
Learning about recognizing early signs has helped me recognize early verbal words in a way that I wouldn’t have without Lane’s instruction. So many of the tips for recognizing early approximations of signs parallel ways to recognize approximations of verbal words.
What We Love about Baby Sign Language
Max is such a social baby and has always been that way, and so I think baby sign language really meshed well with his natural predilections and strengths.
Splashing in slime
Baby sign language makes life so much easier and less frustrating when you are able to understand one another. But mostly, it has given me a source of mastery and accomplishment. Baby sign language has been an antidote to the helplessness I’ve felt throughout the feeding issues. To be able to know what he needed or wanted, and to meet that need if we could, has helped me feel competent, effective, and attuned. So many times I have thought, “What do parents with babies who CAN’T sign do?”
How Tiny Signs Online Helped
Tiny Signs has without a doubt been the foundation of our success.
The Tiny Signs class is presented in digestible chunks that are accessible and easy for busy family. Nothing is repetitive or extraneous. The tips are useful and not necessarily something you would find elsewhere. But really, the key is Lane.
Lane is so inspiring! She helps you stay connected to the fun. Lane’s spirit and passion is contagious. You feel gratitude that your paths crossed and that what she is doing is a calling.
Lane is so responsive and encouraging in a genuine and heartfelt way—and that is hard to convey via electronic means! Every time Max signs a new sign, I want to show her a video to share in the excitement. We wouldn’t be here without her.
Lane, you are amazing, and we’re so thrilled to have had your help. We can’t thank you enough.
Babies begin communicating from the moment they are born – using cries, coos & grunts to make their needs and desires known. As their bodies and minds develop, their communication evolves to include eye gaze and even pointing at objects that interest them.
Whether or not they are exposed to sign language, all babies communicate through non-verbal gestures. Most will wave, point, and even lift their arms to be picked up. Babies do this because their receptive language (what they understand) develops months ahead of their expressive language (what they can communicate). How does sign language fit in? Using sign language with your baby simply builds on this natural expressive ability.
Baby sign language is the practice of using this natural ability to communicate using gestures to facilitate quality communication before a baby’s ability to speak has developed.
How Signing Affects Language Development
A question that often comes up when discussing using sign language to communicate with an infant is “how will signing affect my baby’s speech development?”
Let’s take a look at the evidence: in research studies on using sign language with babies, none have shown that using signing causes a delay in language development. In fact, the overwhelming majority of research shows that signing has many positive short-term and long-term effects.
While there have been many studies done on this topic, the most influential research was conducted in the 1980s by researchers at University of California, by Drs. Linda Acredolo and Susan Goodwyn. This study was funded by the National Institute of Health and it was inspired by Dr. Acredolo’s personal experience with her own baby…
Dr. Acredolo noticed her infant daughter “blowing” at the fish in the aquarium at the pediatrician’s office. Later in the day, when putting her daughter down for a nap, Dr. Acredolo ‘activated’ the fish mobile above her daughter’s crib by blowing on it to make it spin. Realizing her baby was communicating the concept ‘fish’ by making blowing gestures, Dr. Acredolo (along with Dr. Goodwyn) went on to conduct one of the largest research projects on infants and pre-verbal communication.
The result of the National Institute of Health research project were nothing short of amazing! The researchers compared a group of 11 month old infants who were exposed to signs and gestures to a control group of 11 month old infants who were exposed only to speech only. Drs. Acredolo and Goodwyn found the following:
By aged 2, the group of signing babies:
Had larger vocabularies
Understood more words
Had stronger language skills overall, and
Used longer sentences
How Signing Affects Cognitive Development
Drs. Acredolo and Goodwyn followed up with the infants in their original study when the children were age 8 and found that the children who were signed to as infants had, on average, IQs that were 12 points higher than their non-signing peers.
Other notable research by Dr. Marilyn Daniels studied the impact of using sign language in the early childhood classroom (preschool and kindergarten). Her research focused on how signing affects literacy in hearing children. Her research found that young students in classrooms that incorporated signing into the lesson had many positive effects on young learners and that students in signing classrooms scored significantly higher on vocabulary test than the students in the typical classrooms.
Students in the signing classrooms
Had better letter and sound recognition
Were better spellers with larger vocabularies
Had higher reading levels
Dr. Daniels concluded that signing had a positive impact on test scores and literacy skills because it accommodates multiple learning styles including auditory, visual & kinesthetic learning.
How Signing Affects Social & Emotional Development
Most child development experts will cite that frustration is the main cause of toddler tantrums and meltdown. Often this frustration stems from an inability to communicate and be understood. Using signing to facilitate communication during this challenging time can have an incredible impact on both infants and caregivers.
Some research has been done to study how signing impacts the parent-child relationship. Findings suggest that babies who sign receive better language feedback from their caregivers. For example, a baby who points at a new object might initiate a discussion about the object of interest with their mother.
Studies also suggest that parents who use signs with their babies experience less stress and frustration, and are more affectionate with their babies. Research also has shown that signing babies are more engaged and connected with their parents and initiate interaction more often.
From an evidence-based perspective, the body of research supporting sign language use with infants and toddlers is compelling. The number of studies itself demonstrate the interest and awareness of this enriching way of communicating with babies. In the course of research, popular doubts and concerns such as delayed speech from signing have been effectively debunked. Most importantly, the research helps to validate the curiosity and desire parents have to start communicating with their little ones much sooner than “mama” or “dada” is first uttered.
Research Summary of Benefits of Signing with Babies:
Reduced frustration
Improved communication
Enhanced self-esteem
Expanded spoken vocabulary
Increased interest in books
Higher IQ
“Infant sign language really does deliver on its promise of improved communication.”
– The American Academy of Pediatrics
References
Acredolo, LP and Goodwyn SW. 1988. Symbolic gesturing in normal infants. Child Development 59: 450-466.
Acredolo, Linda P., and Goodwyn, Susan W., The Longterm Impact of Symbolic Gesturing During Infancy on IQ at Age 8, International Conference on Infant Studies (July 18, 2000: Brighton, UK).
Daniels, Marilyn, Dancing with Words: Signing for Hearing Children’s Literacy. Bergin & Garvey, October 2000.
Daniels, M. (1994). The Effects of Sign Language on Hearing Children’s Language Development. Communication Education, October, v43 n4, p291 (8).
Daniels, M. (1996). Seeing Language: The Effect Over Time of Sign Language on Vocabulary Development in Early Childhood Education. Child Study Journal, 26, 193-208.
Gongora, X. and C. Farkas, Infant sign language program effects on synchronic mother-infant interactions. Infant Behavior & Development, 2009. 32: p. 216-225.
Iverson JM and Goldin-Meadow S. 2005. Gesture paves the way for language development. Psychological Science 16(5): 367-371.
Claire D. Vallotton, Catherine C. Ayoub, Symbols Build Communication and Thought: The Role of Gestures and Words in the Development of Engagement Skills and Social-Emotional Concepts During Toddlerhood, Social Development 19:3,601-626 (August 2010)
Vallotton, C., Infant signs as Intervention? Promoting symbolic gestures for preverbal children in low-income families supports responsive parent-child relationships. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, Volume 27, Issue 3.
