Caught in the act

Well hello there.

Today is Memorial Day and a day of perfectly American contradictions. The celebration of a day free from work and obligation, and families gathering for picnics under the sun is supposed to be about a day of remembrance for all the soldiers lost and injured in the wars of our country. Even here, in our heavily militarized and armed-forces-supporting city of San Diego, Memorial Day is called the "unofficial start of summer," when hordes of people start their yearly pilgrimage to our famous beaches. Hardly the grandiose remembrance our fallen soldiers likely imagined receiving.

I feel a tide of change coming fast and strong in our family, and we are doing our best to prepare little by little, day by day. Soon we will head to the mountains and claim a new home for ourselves; it seems yet another birthday of mine is rife with the major changes that are peppered throughout my life. I've spent two birthdays on airplanes (one coming home from months in Ghana), and another in Buenos Aires, two days before boarding a plane back stateside after five months abroad. Change is inevitable. Change is good. Change is what keeps our lives exciting and alive. But change is a lot of work, especially with a curious, fast, and impish toddler imprinting the process with her gigantic presence.

Speaking of that toddler, here are a few recent-ish videos of Del signing. I've combined them together for a quick montage, and. . .(drum roll please) I finally figured out a simple way to add text to the videos! For someone as technologically challenged as myself, I'm pretty proud of this accomplishment. To view them, you need a browser that is NOT Firefox, and you will need to watch the video in YouTube instead of imbedded here.

Along the lines of the videos, Del has added yet more words to her ASL vocabulary. In a nutshell, here are what I recall off the top of my head: baby, horse, sheep, deer, cow, frog, cool, strawberry, brush, fish, airplane, car, dance/music, hear

My current favorite sign is for "flower," which she produces with a "1" handshape, fingertip firmly INSIDE of her nose, and with a rotation of the wrist. She makes location and handshape errors sometimes, and still gets some categories a little confused. She's trying to make sense of the subtle differences between dogs and cats, and continues to insist that chihuahuas are cats, no matter how many times we tell her otherwise.

In English, Del now has four words and one animal sound. She says "hi," "dada," "mama," (rare) "bye bye" and "oooo" (moo). She says "oooo" for horses and cows so we still have some kinks to work out. She understands most two step commands in English as well as ASL now, and continues to surprise me with the depth of her comprehension. I love how her ASL usage gives me better insight into her understanding of what goes on around her, and reinforces the idea that children are much, MUCH smarter than most of us tend to give them credit for.

Enjoy the videos, and as always, I openly encourage you to share your thoughts!

Del adds "mama" to BOTH her languages!

Hallelujah! At long last "mama" has crossed the lips of my dear child, and a sign has emerged to refer to me that does not look exactly like "milk." The sign came a few days ago in the form of a "1" sign produced around the cheek/jaw area. Del said "mama" for the first time just today ("today" was April 27th) while holding her arms for me to pick her up. I started celebrating like a fool but couldn't help it; there's just something magical about your baby calling you mama for the very first time.

I've gone through and made some lists and organized things a bit so they make more sense from a developmental point of view. I've categorized Del's ASL signs to date by handshape as much as possible so that it's easier to see the correlation between her fine motor development and her manual language bursts. Typically, the first handshape babies use when learning ASL is the "open hand" or "5 hand." This handshape can be manipulated as soon as the child is able to extend the fingers open from the palm.

Although it's not clear if motor development always drives language development or vice versa with respect to manual language learners (although I'm inclined to believe it works both ways, as with most things in this world), it's pretty simple to see that when babies start to use their hands to talk, the (proto-)signs used do not require a great deal of skill. As the signing child improves her nonlinguistic dexterity (for example, extending an index finger from a closed fist to perhaps pick a nostril), the handshapes that start to emerge for signing are naturally derived from these new and more complex physical abilities.

In that line of thinking, something that I am very curious about is whether children who sign tend to have accelerated fine motor development. For example, I wonder if children who are born into signing families master a motor milestone such as the pincer grasp sooner than children who learn only spoken languages. For a signing child, the motivation for such developments is doubled, meaning: the pincer grasp, in addition to being an excellent blueberry-nabbing tool, is also a linguistic handshape for many useful signs in ASL (a.k.a. the "G" handshape).

Now, back to the matter "at hand" (so to speak). . .

Del's ASL as of April 27th, 2011 (13 months, 11 days)

"5"

"hi" "please" "tree" "cheese" "more(2)" "thank you" "bye-bye" "want(1)" "finish (all done)" "don't want" "sleep(2)" "high-five!"

"Open A"

"milk"

"1"

"daddy" "mommy" "water" "where?" "what's that? (pointing)" "sleep(1)" "more(1)"

"G"

"more(3)" "birdie" "pick up" 

 "Curved Hand"

"share" "change" 

 "Claw 5"

"basketball" "ball" "want(2)"

 "Flat B"

"doggie"

The words with numbers next to them indicate either two different variations on a sign, or a sign that uses two different handshapes (such as "1" pointed into the palm of "5" to indicate "more," compared with two "G" handshapes meeting at the fingertips for the same meaning). The handshapes are produced in different locations with various different movements for the words listed. Some of her handshapes are not precise yet, such as her "claw 5," which is produced with slightly less "clawing" than seen in the photo above. However, the 6 handshapes that she uses so far are visually distinct from one-another, and are used consistently to communicate a surprising variety of words (26!!).  There are a couple Del-invented signs that cannot be described simply, such as "poop" and "don't want." I will do my best to capture these more intricate Del-isms on video to share what they look like.

Del continues to link two signs together in multiple different ways, typically with "more (insert food or drink)" or "where (mommy/daddy/milk)?" She uses the head shake "no" as a linguistic tool, for example pointing to the fridge for me to open it and then waiting as I list things inside as she either points and smiles to indicate, "that's what I want!" or shakes her head no. My favorite new development is when we ask Del if she is ready to go to sleep. She will either shake her head no or point to the bedroom and sign "sleep." This has alleviated so much nap-time and bedtime drama in recent weeks, and the pure fact that she has a role in the decision seems to make her that much more eager to drift off to la-la land.

Speaking of la-la land, that's where I am heading! Until next time, happy signing/talking/singing/sharing/speaking/listening/loving! Good night.