Infant Sign

La comunicación gestual, entendida como el uso de gestos no verbales antes de la aparición de la palabra, es una fortaleza en niños con síndrome de Down (SD).Objetivo: Describir conductas de desarrollo comunicativo en niños con SD, previo y posterior a capacitaciones en comunicación gestual, basadas en talleres de “Señas, palabras y juegos” del programa Baby Signs®.Sujetos y Método: Estudio prospectivo de niños con SD entre 18 y 22 meses de edad cognitiva, a los cuales se les realizó capacitaciones en comunicación gestual según la metodología Baby Signs, evaluando habilidades comunicativas a través del inventario McArthur adaptado para niños con SD (Inventario de desarrollo comunicativo, CDI-SD), analizando los puntajes antes y 3 meses después de la intervención. Los ítems evaluados corresponden a: Comprensión temprana, Comprensión de las primeras frases, Comenzando a hablar, Lista de vocabulario y Uso descontextualizado del lenguaje (parte 1) y a Gestos totales, tempranos y tardíos...

In the current study, we examined caregiver-infant interaction during symbolic play and compared it to interaction in a comparable but non-symbolic context (i.e., 'functional' play). Fifty-four (N = 54) caregivers and their 18-month-old infants were observed engaging in 20 min of play (symbolic, functional). Play interactions were coded and compared across play conditions for joint attention (JA) and gesture use. Compared with functional play, symbolic play was characterized by greater frequency and duration of JA and greater gesture use, particularly the use of iconic gestures with an object in hand. The results suggest that symbolic play provides a rich context for the exchange and negotiation of meaning, and thus may contribute to the development of important skills underlying communicative development. Statement of contribution Current knowledge Symbolic play has long been linked to communicative development. We do not know the extent to which the social context of symbolic play fosters communicative skills. Present study We test whether key communicative acts (joint attention, gesture) are more common in infantcaregiver dyads during symbolic versus functional play. Joint attention was established more often and sustained for longer periods in symbolic play than in functional play. Infants and caregivers produced more in-hand representational gestures in symbolic compared to functional play. A crucial claim of socio-cultural developmental theory is that specific behaviours and contexts support children's entry into the distinctly symbolic nature of human society

La comunicación gestual, entendida como el uso de gestos no verbales antes de la aparición de la palabra, es una fortaleza en niños con síndrome de Down (SD).Objetivo: Describir conductas de desarrollo comunicativo en niños con SD, previo y posterior a capacitaciones en comunicación gestual, basadas en talleres de “Señas, palabras y juegos” del programa Baby Signs®.Sujetos y Método: Estudio prospectivo de niños con SD entre 18 y 22 meses de edad cognitiva, a los cuales se les realizó capacitaciones en comunicación gestual según la metodología Baby Signs, evaluando habilidades comunicativas a través del inventario McArthur adaptado para niños con SD (Inventario de desarrollo comunicativo, CDI-SD), analizando los puntajes antes y 3 meses después de la intervención. Los ítems evaluados corresponden a: Comprensión temprana, Comprensión de las primeras frases, Comenzando a hablar, Lista de vocabulario y Uso descontextualizado del lenguaje (parte 1) y a Gestos totales, tempranos y tardíos...

Mothers have key roles in their children's speech development. Sibling a child true love is an essential step in speech development. Simply talking to a child and getting a conversation going by means of emotional expression, gestures and sounds equally important while doing this, it is necessarily to follow the child's lead signs, expressions, gestures, emotions, praising and appreciating what the child's manages to do and helping him or her to focus on his or her attention, thus sharing the child's experiences. Mothers therefore, play a big role in helping their children to learn rules, limits values and more importantly develop their speech in a natural manner.

Reading to young children and its links to literacy have been researched on a number of levels over a long period of time. The importance of this research is demonstrated by the continued interest in this area. Although many aspects of this topic have been explored, there is little research on nonverbal communication during shared storybook reading. This study explores the characteristics of nonverbal communication that are present during reading interactions between mothers and children, aged 2 to 4 years. Five dyads were videotaped and audiotaped while reading stories together. Eye contact, facial expression, pointing, gestures, body orientation, touch and body contact, and paralanguage were coded and analyzed to identify patterns of parent-child interaction. Findings suggest that nonverbal communication serves important purposes in shared book-reading. Some of these are: drawing attention to the text or pictures in a book, emphasizing important information in the book, reinforcing correct responses ofthe child, monitoring the child's behavior, and creating a positive shared reading experience. Although further research is necessary, this study begins to look at the role of nonverbal communication during storybook reading.

Introduction: Baby sign language is gaining in popularity. However, research has indicated a lack of empirical research supporting its use. In addition, research suggests that baby sign training may increase stress levels in parents. Methods: Nine families with children ranging in age from six months to two years; five months participated in a baby sign workshop. Survey data were analysed to determine parental stress levels as a result of the workshop or using signs with their children. Additionally, information from parents regarding parent-child interactions was recorded. Results: The data suggests that the use of baby signs enhanced parent-child communication, strengthened the parent-child bond, and reduced frustration. Furthermore, the data indicated that the use of baby signs with infants did not cause increased stress on parents. Key aspects of baby sign training that seem to reduce and inhibit stress in parents are discussed.

Mothers have key roles in their children’s speech development.Sibling a child true love is an essential step in speech development. Simply talking to a child and getting a conversation going by means of emotional expression, gestures and sounds equally important while doing this, it is necessarily to follow the child’s lead signs, expressions, gestures, emotions, praising and appreciating what the child’s manages to do and helping him or her to focus on his or her attention, thus sharing the child’s experiences. Mothers therefore, play a big role in helping their children to learn rules, limits values and more importantly develop their speech in a natural manner

Mothers have key roles in their children's speech development. Sibling a child true love is an essential step in speech development. Simply talking to a child and getting a conversation going by means of emotional expression, gestures and sounds equally important while doing this, it is necessarily to follow the child's lead signs, expressions, gestures, emotions, praising and appreciating what the child's manages to do and helping him or her to focus on his or her attention, thus sharing the child's experiences. Mothers therefore, play a big role in helping their children to learn rules, limits values and more importantly develop their speech in a natural manner.

Research shows that young children, typically developing with no developmental delays, hearing impairments or visual impairments, can acquire sign language to communicate their wants or needs prior to their ability to communicate through spoken language. However, much of the research reviewed focused on whether it was normative for young children to use signs or symbolic gestures to represent objects, make

La comunicación gestual, entendida como el uso de gestos no verbales antes de la aparición de la palabra, es una fortaleza en niños con síndrome de Down (SD).Objetivo: Describir conductas de desarrollo comunicativo en niños con SD, previo y posterior a capacitaciones en comunicación gestual, basadas en talleres de “Señas, palabras y juegos” del programa Baby Signs®.Sujetos y Método: Estudio prospectivo de niños con SD entre 18 y 22 meses de edad cognitiva, a los cuales se les realizó capacitaciones en comunicación gestual según la metodología Baby Signs, evaluando habilidades comunicativas a través del inventario McArthur adaptado para niños con SD (Inventario de desarrollo comunicativo, CDI-SD), analizando los puntajes antes y 3 meses después de la intervención. Los ítems evaluados corresponden a: Comprensión temprana, Comprensión de las primeras frases, Comenzando a hablar, Lista de vocabulario y Uso descontextualizado del lenguaje (parte 1) y a Gestos totales, tempranos y tardíos...

Research shows that young children, typically developing with no developmental delays, hearing impairments or visual impairments, can acquire sign language to communicate their wants or needs prior to their ability to communicate through spoken language. However, much of the research reviewed focused on whether it was normative for young children to use signs or symbolic gestures to represent objects, make

Reading to young children and its links to literacy have been researched on a number of levels over a long period of time. The importance of this research is demonstrated by the continued interest in this area. Although many aspects of this topic have been explored, there is little research on nonverbal communication during shared storybook reading. This study explores the characteristics of nonverbal communication that are present during reading interactions between mothers and children, aged 2 to 4 years. Five dyads were videotaped and audiotaped while reading stories together. Eye contact, facial expression, pointing, gestures, body orientation, touch and body contact, and paralanguage were coded and analyzed to identify patterns of parent-child interaction. Findings suggest that nonverbal communication serves important purposes in shared book-reading. Some of these are: drawing attention to the text or pictures in a book, emphasizing important information in the book, reinforcing correct responses ofthe child, monitoring the child's behavior, and creating a positive shared reading experience. Although further research is necessary, this study begins to look at the role of nonverbal communication during storybook reading.

This article reports on how symbolic gesturing was applied in a nursery setting. Forms of signing systems have been well documented as contributing to communication, predominately used alongside speech when there is a different mother tongue or a physical impairment (Felix, 2018; Goodwyn and Acredolo, 1993) Symbolic Gesturing (SG), is an emerging area to support pre-verbal infants in communicating more effectively. In this article SG was evaluated as way of reflecting and developing practitioner's emotional responses and initiations with the infants in their care. The narratives of three practitioners using SG were gathered over several months and revealed how SG created further opportunities for reflection regarding the emotional relationships with infants they cared for. SG was considered a valuable approach to enhancing the emotional interactional connections with infants, resulting in closer, more attuned relationships.

Adults' gestures support children's learning in problem-solving tasks, but gestures may be differentially useful to children of different ages, and different features of gestures may make them more or less useful to children. The current study investigated parents' use of gestures to support their young children (1.5-6 years) in a block puzzle task (N = 126 parent-child dyads), and identified patterns in parents' gesture use indicating different gestural strategies. Further, we examined the effect of child age on both the frequency and types of gestures parents used, and on their usefulness to support children's learning. Children attempted to solve the puzzle independently before and after receiving help from their parent; half of the parents were instructed to sit on their hands while they helped. Parents who could use their hands appear to use gestures in three strategies: orienting the child to the task, providing abstract information, and providing embodied information; further, they adapted their gesturing to their child's age and skill level. Younger children elicited more frequent and more proximal gestures from parents. Despite the greater use of gestures with younger children, it was the oldest group (4.5-6.0 years) who were most affected by parents' gestures. The oldest group was positively affected by the total frequency of parents' gestures, and in particular, parents' use of embodying gestures (indexes that touched their referents, representational demonstrations with object in hand, and physically guiding child's hands). Though parents rarely used the embodying strategy with older children, it was this strategy which most enhanced the problem-solving of children 4.5-6 years. Keywords gesture; embodied gesture; informal instruction; parent-child interaction; individual differences; puzzle; problem-solving While it is evident that adults gesture during their verbal interactions with young children, it is not yet clear how gestures might impact children's cognition and learning. Moreover, different types of gestures may achieve different results. Index, or deictic, gestures, such as pointing towards, tapping, and showing a physical object in order to indicate it, may help children to focus their attention on the most relevant components of a task (Bangerter, 2004). Gestures that provide representational information that reinforces or complements

Social skills and symbol skills are positively associated in middle childhood, but the relation between these domains is less clear in newly verbal toddlers. Vygotsky (1934/1986) proposed that symbols are both tools for interaction and mental tools for thought. Do symbols help even very young children build skills for interacting with and conceptualizing the social world? Longitudinal data from 108 children and mothers were collected when children were 14, 24, and 36 months. Children's gestures and words during mother-child interactions were used as symbol skill indicators to predict children's abilities to engage others and the number of social-emotional concepts children portray during play. In a series of growth models, words had a stronger effect on engagement skills while early gesture use predicted later development of social-emotional concepts. Therefore, even in early development, symbols serve as both communication tools and mental tools to construct understanding of the social-emotional world. Keywords social development; language; gesture; early childhood; symbol Even before children can consistently use language, symbols, in the form of words or gestures, facilitate social interactions of many kinds. By the time they are three years old, most children are adept at using words to engage and communicate with others, as well as to represent increasingly complex social concepts. But the beginnings of this connection between developmental domains can be seen in everyday interactions in infancy and toddlerhood, as illustrated by the anecdotes below. During a typical morning in an infant classroom, 13-month-old Ji-Yun turned to her caregiver and pointed out the window. The caregiver responded "You're pointing out the window. Do you see that bird in the tree?" Ji-Yun flapped both arms up and down, the gesture she learned to symbolize bird. "That's right," the caregiver said, "you see the bird." Ji-Yun smiled. She had successfully engaged her caregiver in a social interaction using simple gestures. i In the toddler classroom next door, 23-month-old Daniel got his caregivers' attention, then pointed to a stuffed bear which lay on a wooden block. He put his

Do infants explicitly recognize feelings and emotions in themselves and others? What would preverbal children say about internal states if they had the words? Investigation of infants' emotional understanding is limited by the challenge of understanding infant mental states before the onset of speech. I examined the use of symbolic gestures by normally hearing, preverbal children to discover whether infants and toddlers represent emotion concepts such as sad and scared, and feeling words such as sleepy. Participants were 22 children (5-28 months) in a childcare program where caregivers modeled symbolic gestures. Gesture use by children and caregivers were videotaped and coded to determine context, characteristics, and frequency. Twenty of 22 children used symbolic gestures; of these, 6 used emotion gestures, and 5 used feeling gestures. These gestures were not imitations of adult gestures, and qualitative data reveal their context and significance. Symbolic gestures reveal the sophistication of infants' internal worlds and their ability and desire to communicate thoughts and feelings. Symbolic gestures are a promising methodology for investigating early explicit mental processes. As a therapeutic communication tool, symbolic gestures may help children express emotions, participate in conversations about emotion, and construct their own understanding of internal states. Katie, 27 months old, sat at the art table in the toddler classroom with her mother and caregiver and played with the paint. Katie looked intently at the picture that she was drawing. She painted a circle and said "Happy face," and smiled. Then, looking at her mother, she said "Mama, you make a happy face." Katie's mother painted a circle. Katie took her paint brush and put two dots in her mother's circle; she looked up and said "Eyes." She smiled and, taking her brush again, painted a line in the circle, saying "Smile." She added a third dot, smiled, and said "I made a nose!" Her classroom caregiver reflected, "Katie, you finished the happy face! You put eyes and a nose and a mouth on the happy face!" Katie smiled and returned to her painting. Meanwhile, 24-month-old Gerry stood by the front door of the toddler classroom crying, and whimpered "Mommy." He walked over to the book shelves, slapped a single hand at a few of the books, and then paused as he cried. Gerry's caregiver, Mandy, approached and sat down next to him, saying "Gerry, I see that you are sad. You're thinking about your mom." He continued to cry and crawled onto a soft chair. Mandy asked "Do you want to read a book?" Gerry whimpered "Yes." He climbed slowly out of the chair, walked to the books, and went directly to the book about gorillas. He carried it to Mandy, sat between her legs, looked up at her, still sad, and said "Mommy." Mandy responded "This is the book your mom was reading to you." With his head down and hands busy flipping open the book pages, Gerry whispered "Yes." Mandy began to read.

Understanding the context for children's social learning and language acquisition requires consideration of caregivers' multi-modal (speech, gesture) messages. Though young children can interpret both manual and head gestures, little research has examined the communicative input that children receive via parents' head gestures. We longitudinally examined the frequency and communicative functions of mothers' head nodding and head shaking gestures during laboratory play sessions for 32 mother-child dyads, when the children were 14, 20, and 30 months of age. The majority of mothers produced head nods more frequently than head shakes. Both gestures contributed to mothers' verbal attempts at behavior regulation and dialog. Mothers' head nods primarily conveyed agreement with, and attentiveness to, children's utterances, and accompanied affirmative statements and yes/no questions. Mothers' head shakes primarily conveyed prohibitions and statements with negations. Changes over time appeared to reflect corresponding developmental changes in social and communicative dimensions of caregiver-child interaction. Directions for future research are discussed regarding the role of head gesture input in socialization and in supporting language development.

Attention sharing provides an important context for infant learning, but it is not fully understood how infants respond to parents' isolated or combined actions to shift from nonsharing to attention-sharing states. To investigate this, we recorded unscripted toy-play interactions of infants (3 to 11 months old, N = 35) and mothers at home, and coded attention-related behaviors. These included infants' and mothers' visual fixations, and mothers' attention-directing actions including gaze shifts, pointing gestures, object manipulations, verbalizations, and object sounds. In addition, dyadic attention was continuously classified into one of seven states of shared or nonshared attention. Results showed that mothers usually produced a combination of attention-directing cues within the 7 sec. before infants shifted their attention to match the mother's focus. Mothers' cue combinations usually included object manipulation and either a gaze shift or a verbalization. Infants seldom looked at mothers' faces and followed a very small proportion of isolated gaze shifts or pointing gestures. However, infants frequently shifted attention to watch mothers manipulate objects. The results indicate that during toy play, combinations of maternal attention-specifying actions selectively elicit infants' attention following.

In recent years, some studies have indicated that some aspects of language performance of children from low socioeconomic status (SES) families are lower in language tests. Appropriate and timely interventions can partially prevent communication problems in these children. This study aimed to investigate the effect of a parental education program on word acquisition rates in Iranian toddlers from low SES families. Materials and Methods: Sixty-six mothers (toddlers aged 12-14 months) participated in this randomized controlled trial study. These mothers were allocated to the experimental group and control group using the randomization method of the permuted block (each block=6). After baseline assessments, mothers in the experimental group received parental education program aimed at enriching the mother-child interactions and mothers' knowledge of communication development for 9 weeks. The control group did not receive any education. The outcome measures were children's scores on the Persian version of the McArthur-Bates communicative development inventories and mothers' scores in multiple-choice exams regarding workshops' contents. Data were analyzed using of Chi-square test, independent t test and paired samples t-test, Mann-Whitney U-test, and Wilcoxon signed-rank test. Results: Both groups had a significant increase in vocabulary size, while changes in the experimental group were more than double that of the control group (P\u003c0.001). Other aspects of communicative behaviors, such as imitation, naming, and intentionality were changed only in the experimental group according to the course of typical development (P\u003c0.001). Mothers significantly got higher scores after the workshops in a multiple-choice exam regarding children's communication, language, and interaction (P\u003c0.001). Conclusion: The results demonstrate that mothers' knowledge of communication development is malleable and probably has positive effects on the communication behaviors of toddlers from low SES backgrounds.

Very young children seem to know that people experience several mental states: desires, perceptions, emotions. In three studies, we investigated 2-and young 3-year-olds' judgments and communications about how these states connect together in people's lives and minds. Two experimental studies with 56 participants demonstrated young children's understanding of at least one set of connections: In appropriate circumstances, a person's perception of desirable or undesirable objects leads to related emotional experiences. A complementary investigation of four young children's everyday conversations demonstrated their awareness of and expression of several additional connections between people's desires, perceptions, and emotions.

In the current study, we examined caregiver-infant interaction during symbolic play and compared it to interaction in a comparable but non-symbolic context (i.e., 'functional' play). Fifty-four (N = 54) caregivers and their 18-month-old infants were observed engaging in 20 min of play (symbolic, functional). Play interactions were coded and compared across play conditions for joint attention (JA) and gesture use. Compared with functional play, symbolic play was characterized by greater frequency and duration of JA and greater gesture use, particularly the use of iconic gestures with an object in hand. The results suggest that symbolic play provides a rich context for the exchange and negotiation of meaning, and thus may contribute to the development of important skills underlying communicative development. Statement of contribution Current knowledge Symbolic play has long been linked to communicative development. We do not know the extent to which the social context of symbolic play fosters communicative skills. Present study We test whether key communicative acts (joint attention, gesture) are more common in infantcaregiver dyads during symbolic versus functional play. Joint attention was established more often and sustained for longer periods in symbolic play than in functional play. Infants and caregivers produced more in-hand representational gestures in symbolic compared to functional play. A crucial claim of socio-cultural developmental theory is that specific behaviours and contexts support children's entry into the distinctly symbolic nature of human society

Research on the intersections of young children's emerging communication skills and emotion regulation has increased, following recognition of the link between these skills as they emerge in toddlerhood and the long-term impact of these skills on academic success. However, little is known about how toddlers use gesture and emerging language for emotion regulation. The current study describes toddlers' use of both words and gestures in naturally occurring distressing routines in childcare (diaper change, separation from parents). Seventeen toddlers between 11 and 28 months old were observed over the course of 3½ months in a childcare setting where symbolic gestures ("infant signs") were used as part of daily routines. Results show that toddlers communicated more frequently using gestures than speech, and used a greater range of self-regulatory strategies through gesture than through speech. Moreover, older, verbal toddlers continued to use gestures during heightened distress when they could not find their words. Findings suggest that toddlers use symbolic communication to implement complex and diverse emotion regulation strategies during distressing daily routines, and that gestures provide children with opportunities to employ more diverse emotion regulation strategies than does speech alone, which may ultimately enhance children's abilities to regulate their emotions.

Babysign classes are increasingly popular across the UK. Benefits are said to include increasing child vocabulary, reducing frustration, and improving parentchild relations. A further relationship between the use of babysign and maternal mind-mindedness has been suggested. It was hypothesised here that parents choosing babysign classes would describe their child using more mind-minded comments than those attending other toddler classes and that their children would have greater language skills. The mind-mindedness scores of 34 mother-child dyads attending parent-toddler activities were measured using Meins et al.'s (2010) research protocol. Mothers also completed a communicative checklist for language and gesture use and understanding. Results indicate that mothers who choose to use babysign describe their children with significantly more mindminded attributes, but language skills do not differ between the two groups of children. This supports the hypothesis that mothers using baby-sign would show more mind-mindedness than mothers not using babysign.

The development of proficient communication skills in infants and toddlers is an important component to child development. A popular trend gaining national media attention is teaching sign language to babies with normal hearing whose parents also have normal hearing. Thirty-three websites were identified that advocate sign language for hearing children as a way of promoting better developmental outcomes. These sites make several claims about the positive benefits of teaching hearing infants and toddlers to sign, such as earlier communication, improved language development, increased IQ, reduced tantrums, higher self-esteem, and improved parent-child bonding. Without endorsing or disparaging these claims, the purpose of this article was to evaluate the strength of evidence cited on websites that promote products to teach young children to use sign language. Cumulatively, 82 pieces of evidence were cited by the websites as supporting research. However, over 90% of these citations were opinion articles without any supporting data or descriptions of products and only eight were empirical research studies relevant to the benefits of teaching sign language to young children with normal hearing. Unfortunately, there is not enough high-quality evidence cited on these websites to draw research-based conclusions about whether teaching sign language to young children with normal hearing results in better developmental outcomes.

Introduction: Studies have shown that many children with early language difficulties also have delays in social-emotional competencies as well as social-emotional and behavioral problems. It is unclear if these conditions are causally related, if they share a common underlying etiology, or if there are bidirectional effects. Studies investigating these associations have mostly involved children who are already using words to communicate, but it is important to know whether delays in preverbal communication and language development have any effects on these associations. The aim of the present study was to examine associations between preverbal communication and early verbal skills in infancy and subsequent social-emotional competencies and ensuing socialemotional and behavioral problems in early toddlerhood. The role of background factors known to influence early language development was also examined. Methods: The sample consisted of 395 children (51.6% boys) from the Finnish Steps Study cohort. Language was assessed at age 13 months (+ 1 month) with the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory for Infants (CDI-I), and the social-emotional domain was assessed at age < 17 months with the Brief Infant-Toddler Social and Emotional Assessment (BITSEA). Results: Infants with lower preverbal gestural communication and receptive language skills had a higher risk of delays in social-emotional competencies in toddlerhood than children with better communication skills, but not of elevated social-emotional and behavioral problems. The results indicate that lower early communication skills can predict delays in the development of social-emotional competencies, which has been found to be a risk factor for later development of social-emotional and behavioral problems. It is important to monitor early communication skills to provide guidance to parents in supporting early pragmatic communication and language development in infancy, if needed.

This prospective longitudinal study examined the relationship between caregiver input to 9-month-old infants and their subsequent language. Mother–infant dyads were videotaped at ages 9, 12, and 30 months. Language comprehension (at 12 and 18 months) was measured by parent report and correlated with an independent language measure. Three maternal style variables were reduced from the 9-month data. Only caregivers&#39; contingent comments (CCC) related to infants&#39; later language. These findings held after infants&#39; skill with coordinated joint attention (CJA) was taken into account. The total number of words the mothers used when their infants were 9 months predicted vocabulary; however, the predictive power was encapsulated in the words the mother used during CCC. Because studies have typically examined maternal input once infants&#39; CJA has emerged, this work contributes to current efforts to understand variations in early language development.

Children's emotional expression and language both develop during infancy and early childhood, yet these two communication systems have been studied primarily in isolation. This study focuses instead on assessing the relation between them just as productive language emerges during toddlerhood. Seventy-seven typically developing, firstborn toddlers and their families were recruited at 13 months of age. Using an extreme groups design, earlier and later talkers were selected based on their MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory production scores. Laboratory visits occurred at 15, 21, and 30 months; home visits occurred at 3-month intervals from 15 to 30 months. Observational and parent report measures assessed child language, emotional expression, temperament, and overall developmental functioning. Parents also reported on parenting stress and family life events. Overall, results support a significant relation between emotional expression and productive language that varies according to the specific emotion, a finding that may resolve earlier contradictory results in this area. Earlier talkers expressed more joy/pleasure than did later talkers, but later talkers expressed more fear and anger than did earlier talkers. Potential contributions of various child/family factors were explored. Child temperament is proposed as influencing this relation through its effects on the child's transactions with the caregiving environment.

Babysign classes are increasingly popular across the UK. Benefits are said to include increasing child vocabulary, reducing frustration, and improving parentchild relations. A further relationship between the use of babysign and maternal mind-mindedness has been suggested. It was hypothesised here that parents choosing babysign classes would describe their child using more mind-minded comments than those attending other toddler classes and that their children would have greater language skills. The mind-mindedness scores of 34 mother-child dyads attending parent-toddler activities were measured using Meins et al.'s (2010) research protocol. Mothers also completed a communicative checklist for language and gesture use and understanding. Results indicate that mothers who choose to use babysign describe their children with significantly more mindminded attributes, but language skills do not differ between the two groups of children. This supports the hypothesis that mothers using baby-sign would show more mind-mindedness than mothers not using babysign.

Across America, hearing parents are encouraging their hearing 1-year-olds to use visual-gestural signs, either ASL signs or invented symbolic gestures, hoping to promote earlier and clearer parent-child communication. Most baby-signing families have no exposure to a natural sign language or to the Deaf community. Spoken English remains the families ’ main communication mode, with parents signing occasionally as they speak and children producing single signs, words, or sign-word pairs. Once the children become proficient in speech, most families stop signing. This paper investigates the role of baby signing in hearing children’s language socialization, with attention to the language ideologies that underlie the practice. Data were collected from three sources: 1) videotapes of three baby-signing 1-year-olds interacting with other family members at home, 2) interviews with the children’s parents, and 3) writings on baby signing in the mass media and online. Both the existence of baby ...

Linguistics and communication development in infant can best be understood by tracing the forms and patterns of interaction between a child and other family members especially his/her parents. Father and mother are significant others for a child in developing communication and linguistic capacities. From interview with and observation on families in Poh Roboh, Condong Catur, Sleman Yogyakarta-Indonesia, this research found that the position of parents in the family is important not only for making the relationship better, but also for increasing children’s preparedness for entering the society. Children’s capacities and capabilites in communication  make them emotionally better. There are three imporant positions of familiy in developing a child’s communication. First, parents can increase the capacities and capabilities in semantics, syntactics and pragmatics. These are linguistic dimensions that underlie child’s communication capabilities. Second, parents can be referent for a chi...

INTRODUCTION Gestural communication, understood as the use of non-verbal gestures before the word appears, is a strength in children with Down syndrome (DS). OBJECTIVE To describe com munication development behaviors in children with DS, before and after gestural communication training, based on the &quot;Signs, words and games&quot; workshops of the Baby Signs® program. SUBJECTS AND METHOD Prospective study of children with DS between 18 and 22 months of cognitive age, who were trained in gestural communication according to the &quot;Baby Signs®&quot; methodology, evaluating communication skills through the MacArthur inventory adapted for children with DS (Communica tive Development Inventories, CDI-DS), analyzing the scores before and three months after the in tervention. The evaluated items were: Early comprehension, First sentences comprehension, Starting to speak, Vocabulary list, and Decontextualized language use (part 1) and total, early and late gestures (part 2). RESULTS 21...

La comunicación gestual, entendida como el uso de gestos no verbales antes de la aparición de la palabra, es una fortaleza en niños con síndrome de Down (SD).Objetivo: Describir conductas de desarrollo comunicativo en niños con SD, previo y posterior a capacitaciones en comunicación gestual, basadas en talleres de “Señas, palabras y juegos” del programa Baby Signs®.Sujetos y Método: Estudio prospectivo de niños con SD entre 18 y 22 meses de edad cognitiva, a los cuales se les realizó capacitaciones en comunicación gestual según la metodología Baby Signs, evaluando habilidades comunicativas a través del inventario McArthur adaptado para niños con SD (Inventario de desarrollo comunicativo, CDI-SD), analizando los puntajes antes y 3 meses después de la intervención. Los ítems evaluados corresponden a: Comprensión temprana, Comprensión de las primeras frases, Comenzando a hablar, Lista de vocabulario y Uso descontextualizado del lenguaje (parte 1) y a Gestos totales, tempranos y tardíos...

Talk To Your Baby has been engaged in a research project, under the title of Face to Face, to identify key messages for parents and carers in relation to communicating with babies and young children, and has examined the most effective ways to promote these messages to parents and carers.

Ten-month-old Celia watched her papa make a fire in the woodstove in their living room. Sitting several feet behind him, she watched him crinkle the paper and stack the logs into the stove. The long, bright red lighter lay next to him on the floor. She crawled toward it. From the time she was 6 months old, Celia's mama and papa had been teaching her that the woodstove in the living room was "hot." They used the word repeatedly and paired the word with a gesture: extending one open palm toward, but not touching, the hot object. Celia had begun using this sign when she was 8 months old and used it to describe many different hot objects, including the lighter, showing that she understood the concept "hot." Papa watched out of the corner of his eye as Celia reached toward the lighter, then shook her head and said "No," and then retracted her hand without touching it. She repeated this series of actions again and again: reaching toward the lighter, saying "No" and shaking her head, then retracting her hand. Though very tempted by the bright, fascinating object, Celia successfully prohibited her own inclination by using symbols-both language and gesture-to tell herself not to touch the hot object.

Far from egocentric, infants and toddlers advance significantly in their understanding of others' feelings, desires, goals, intentions, preferences, and views during the first 2 years of life and, in so doing, establish the foundation for later social and emotional understanding. This article surveys those accomplishments, speculates about how they occur so effortlessly, describes advances in psychological understanding of the preschool years, and highlights the significance of these insights from developmental science for how we interact with very young children and nurture their social cognitive development and self-awareness.

Teachers of infants need a large bunch of key ideas and activities of all kinds to unlock in each child the treasures of loving kindness, thoughtful and eloquent use of language, intense active curiosity to learn, willingness to cooperate, and the deep desire to work hard to master new tasks. Here are some ideas that teachers can use during interactions with infants to optimize each child's development. 1. Get to know each baby's unique personality At 4 months, Luci holds her hands in front of her face and turns them back and forth so she can see the curious visual difference between the palms and backs. Jackson, an 8-month-old, bounces happily in accurate rhythm as his teacher bangs on a drum and chants, "Mary had a little lamb whose fleece was white as snow!" Outdoors, 1-year-old Jamie sits in an infant swing peering down at his feet sticking out of the leg holes. How interesting! Those are the same feet he has watched waving in the air while being diapered and has triumphantly brought to his mouth to chew on. Teachers can tune in to each child's special personality-especially the child's temperament. There are three primary, mostly inborn, styles of temperament (Honig 1997). Some babies are more low-key; they tend to be slow to warm up to new caregivers, new foods, and new surroundings. They need reassuring hand-holding and more physical [end of page #1] supports to try a new activity. Others are more feisty and sometimes irritable. They tend to be impetuous, intense in their emotional reactions, whether of anger or of joy. Easygoing babies are typically friendly, happy, accept new foods and caregivers without much fuss, and adapt fairly quickly and more flexibly after experiencing distress or sudden change. Try to find out whether each baby in your care tends to be shy and slow to warm up or mostly feisty and intense or easygoing. A caring adult's perceptive responses in tune with individual temperament will ease a child's ability to adapt and flourish in the group setting. 2. Physical loving Your body is a safe haven for an infant. Indeed, some babies will stay happy as a clam when draped over a shoulder, across your belly as you rock in a rocking chair, or, especially for a very young baby, snuggled in a sling or carrier for hours. As Montagu (1971) taught decades ago, babies need body loving: "To be tender, loving, and caring, human beings must be tenderly loved and cared for in their earliest years.. .. caressed, cuddled, and comforted" (p. 138). As you carry them, some babies might pinch your neck, lick your salty arm, pull at your hair, tug at eyeglasses, or show you in other ways how powerfully important your body is as a sacred and special playground. Teach gentleness by calmly telling a baby you need your glasses on to read a story. Use the word gently over and over and over. Dance cheek-to cheek with a young child in arms to slow waltz music-good for dreary days! Also carry the baby while you do a routine task such as walking to another room to get something. Provide lap and touch times generously to nourish a child's sense of well-being. Slowly caress a baby's hair. Rub a tense shoulder soothingly. Kiss one finger and watch as a baby offers every other finger to kiss. Rock a child with your arms wrapped around him for secure comfort. Babies learn to become independent as we confirm and meet their dependency needs in infancy. A sense of well-being and somatic certainty flows from cherishing adults who generously hold, caress, and drape babies on shoulders and tummies. 3. Create intimate emotional connections Scan the environment so you can be close to every baby. Notice the quiet baby sitting alone, mouthing a toy piece and rocking back and forth with vacant eyes. Notice shy bids for attention, such as a brief smile with lowered lids. The child with an easy or cautious temperament needs your loving attention as much as the one who impulsively climbs all over you for attention.

Part ofa larger investigation of, teacher-child-peer interactions among two-and three-year-old children'in day care, this Microanalytic study of toddler-initiated bids (attempts to communicate with caregivers) and teacher responses depicts in detail toddler-caregiver interaction. Subjects for the study were 25 males and 25 females between the ages of 24 and 30 months who were members Of 16w-income families whose day care fees were paid by Title XX funds. APPROACH (A,ProCedure for Patterning Responses `Of Adults and CHildren), a fine-grained ecological technique for observing' and coding child tinteractiOns with peers, objects, and caregivers was used to recora-80 minutes of behavior per ohild. From the APPROACH records, i dren's)sgmmaication and interaction attempts with teachers wee coded to one and only one of the following five *

Caregiver-infant interactions in the first years of a child's life provide models and shape patterns of responding that can have consequences throughout the lifespan. Research and practice have produced knowledge about the sensitivity of outcomes to characteristics of the infant nurturing situation. Infant caregivers "Mould accept babies' need for sensuous stimulation and intimate relationships. The curriculum for infant caregiving should be embedded in the innumerable daily acts of caring that allow infants' bodies to settle into easy rhythms. Se"sorimotor skill building, and, later, preoperational skill building should be done in a sensitive manner so that infants and toddlers are lured, not pushed, into learnings. Language richness should permeate a baby's day. The infant or toddler's environment must provide safe places for the infants to run, crawl, and gallop about. Discipline in infant caregiving requires that conditions be arranged so that babies are kept as comfortable as possible. Discipline for toddlers may involve arranging the environment so that no-nos are infrequent. To provide an optimal developmental situation for each child, caregivers should none their "noticing skills" to detect the ways in which each early learner markedly differs from others. (RH)

This annotated bibliography provides references of practical use to those conceiiid-with infaAt/toddler caregiving. While many of the works cited concern citalitygroup care for infants and toddlers, some works cited deal spocificaliy-with parenting, the parent/child relationship, and activities parents may Share with their very young children. In general, extensive references giVing broad advice on the topic. of child rearing have not been included. References concerning the entire preschool age span have been cited only when they are especially relevant for infant/toddler educators. Contents are organized in four topical sections: (1) backgfound references to infant/toddler care and development; (2) testing and evaluation of infant/toddler development and education projects; (3) caregiver training and curriculum materials; and (4) concerns for those involved in infant/toddler caregiving programs. Citations preceded by an asterisk indiCate documents available through the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) collection. Appended material describes how to obtain ERIC documents and lists the addresses of each of the 16 ERIC Clearinghouses. (Author/RH)

This guide represents the first attempt to survey and record all the currently available video films, filmstrips, slide cassette programs, and audio programs that have been developed to train caregivers of children under age three. The reviews were completed in 1986. Annotated selections are entered alphabetically. Above each title a symbol identifies the type of inedia for the entry. Following the title, key identifiers (such as anger, feeding, and language development) help identify the entry in terms of specific topics for caregivers. A detailed description of each entry follows, providing a clear idea of the content and method of conveying the main ideas. This is followed by the reviewers' rating of the entry's audiovisual quality and content according to four categories of quality (excellent, good, fair, or poor). In addition, appropriate audiences are specified (for example, caregivers, parents) and other Publishing Information Infans/Toddler Caregiving: An

The ethos behind provision of early intervention programmes to infants and young children with additional support needs has been established for some time (e.g. Right-from-the-Start), but targeting the development of typically developing infants has been a relatively recent phenomenon. Baby sign is one of the many intervention techniques available, alongside programmes focused on movement, music, massage, multisensory experience, as well as reading specifically to infants and toddlers. Some of these alternatives, like baby sign, make claims regarding cognitive and socio-emotional advancements. However, much of this can be based on anecdote and opinion. This has happened in the case of baby sign.

Across America, hearing parents are encouraging their hearing 1-year-olds to use visual-gestural signs, either ASL signs or invented symbolic gestures, hoping to promote earlier and clearer parent-child communication. Most baby-signing families have no exposure to a natural sign language or to the Deaf community. Spoken English remains the families' main communication mode, with parents signing occasionally as they speak and children producing single signs, words, or sign-word pairs. Once the children become proficient in speech, most families stop signing. This paper investigates the role of baby signing in hearing children's language socialization, with attention to the language ideologies that underlie the practice. Data were collected from three sources: 1) videotapes of three babysigning 1-year-olds interacting with other family members at home, 2) interviews with the children's parents, and 3) writings on baby signing in the mass media and online. Both the existence of baby signing and the ways that it is used are consistent with the portrait of middle class American language socialization given in Ochs and Schieffelin (1984), but individual families vary in their uses of signs depending on their children's development and on their families' interactional styles.

Research Findings-The roles of child lexical diversity and maternal sensitivity in the development of young children's inhibitory control were examined in 100 low-income Hispanic Spanish-speaking children. Child communication utterances at age 2½ years were transcribed from 10-min mother-child interactions to quantify lexical diversity. Maternal behavior was rated independently from the interactions. Inhibitory control was measured with a battery of tasks at ages 2½ and 3½. Greater maternal sensitivity was correlated with higher vocabulary at 2½. Greater vocabulary predicted positive growth in child inhibitory control skills from ages 2½ to 3½ in multivariable regression models that controlled for maternal education, family income, the home environment, and mothering quality. Practice or Policy-These findings suggest that supporting vocabulary development in lowincome Spanish-speaking children is important for the development of inhibitory control skills, an important foundation for school readiness and academic success. Hispanics composed 17% of the total U.S. population and 26% of children younger than 5 years in 2012 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2013). Young Hispanic children are disproportionately overrepresented among children living in poverty, with 34% in poverty compared to 25% of young children overall in the United States (U.S. Census Bureau, 2011). Many children in this rapidly growing population lack school readiness skills and are at risk for academic difficulties (

Mothers have key roles in their children's speech development. Sibling a child true love is an essential step in speech development. Simply talking to a child and getting a conversation going by means of emotional expression, gestures and sounds equally important while doing this, it is necessarily to follow the child's lead signs, expressions, gestures, emotions, praising and appreciating what the child's manages to do and helping him or her to focus on his or her attention, thus sharing the child's experiences. Mothers therefore, play a big role in helping their children to learn rules, limits values and more importantly develop their speech in a natural manner.

The quality of the parent-infant interaction during the first year of life is an important predictor of later cognitive and affective child outcomes, such as language development and attachment security. Examining this relationship in the context of a teaching interaction allows the investigation of both the mother's and child's roles in determining the hedonic nature of this relationship. One critical element of this interaction is the ability of the mother to provide a stimulating and positive environment in which the child feels safe and free to explore. This study evaluates the role of maternal personality using the Positive and Negative Affect Scales (PANAS) on this interaction. Mean PANAS positive and negative scores were computed across three time periods during the child's first year. Subscales from the Nursing Child Assessment Teaching Scale (NCATS; 4 mother and 2 child subscales) were used to measure the quality of the teaching interaction between mothers and their 9-(N = 55) and 36-monthold (N = 50) infants. A MANOVA comparing the six NCATS subscales across the two ages (controlling for sex) showed that overall, mothers of 9-month-olds were more sensitive to their children's cues, showed more cognitive growth fostering and made more contingent responses toward their children than mothers of 36-month-olds (all p's c .05). However, 36-month-olds showed clearer cues (vocalizations, facial expressions, bodily movements) during the interaction than did 9-month-olds (Q < .05). The pattern of PANAS-NCATS correlations varied slightly across the two ages. At 9 months, maternal negative affect was related to less cognitive (exploring materials; labeling items) and social (touches, smiles) growth fostering by the mothers, and less responsiveness (eye contact, vocal responses) from the infants (1's range .-.27 to-.40). Maternal positive affect was related to greater cognitive growth fostering (I= .46) and more contingent behavior (vocalizations, praise, smiles) toward the infant (r = .35). At 36 months, mothers with higher negative affect across the first year showed fewer cognitive growth fostering behaviors (r =-.65) and their infants showed less responsiveness toward them (I=-.95). Mothers who reported greater positive affect during the first year showed more cognitive growth fostering (r = .91) and more contingent behaviors (r = .72) and their children also showed clearer cues toward them (I= .66) at age 3. These results suggest that the predominant maternal personality across the infants first year of life not only influences the quality of the mother-infant relationship during that time, but also influences the quality of this relationship two years later. Overall, negative mothers allow their infants less exploration and offer less praise than do those who report less negative affect. Not surprisingly, their infants are less responsive to them during an interaction. Conversely, positive mothers offer a more cognitively and emotionally supportive context while teaching their children challenging tasks, promoting opportunities for their infants to explore and learn in a nurturing environment.