Sign Before They Can Speak

Thanks to contributing authors Emily and Kathleen for the following article.


A key to surviving in a troubled economic system in which opportunities to achieve a decent standard of living will be limited, is versatility. Of course another being, the ability to communicate articulately in a variety of ways with the widest possible audience. This includes bilingual ability as well as the ability to communicate in non-verbal ways for the benefit of the disabled – primarily the deaf.


At the same time, a growing shortage of qualified interpreters fluent in American Sign Language has led to more career opportunities – and if current trends continue, it's likely that skilled ASL interpreters will have little problem securing lucrative employment in a society where such a commodity is destined to be in short supply.


Signing Before They Can Speak


A great deal of research has clearly demonstrated that the early years – ages 2 to five – are the best time to educate children in different modes of communication and language. This goes beyond the spoken word (though it is an optimal time for children to learn a second language); many young children have an aptitude for signing as well. This can be taught at home or some child care programs have begun to teach it in their curriculums.


This really isn't as odd as you may think. As you may already know, many indigenous peoples around the world, including American Indian nations, have used sign language for centuries to facilitate communication with other tribes with whom they do not share a language. Some paleontologists and anthropologists theorize that Neanderthals – who apparently lacked the vocal mechanism to produce many spoken words – depended a great deal upon hand gestures to communicate.


In fact, recent research suggests that sign language is innate. An article published in the Boulder Daily Camera in 2003 presented strong evidence that babies as young as six months old communicate with their hands:


"...by 6 to 7 months, babies can remember a sign. At eight months, children can begin to imitate gestures and sign single words. By 24 months, children can sign compound words and full sentences. They say sign language reduces frustration in young children by giving them a means to express themselves before they know how to talk." (Glarion, 2003)


A study funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development is also cited, demonstrating that young children who are taught sign language at an early age actually develop better verbal skills as they get older. The ability to sign has also helped parents in communicating with autistic children; one parent reports that "using sign language allowed her to communicate with her [autistic] son and minimized his frustration...[he now] has an advanced vocabulary and excels in math, spelling and music" (Glarion, 2003).


The Best Time To Start


Incorporating sign into pre-verbal youngsters early childhood education as a way to communicate can also strengthen the parent-child bond – in addition to giving children a solid foundation for learning a skill that will serve them well in the future. The evidence suggests that the best time to start learning ASL is before a child can even walk – and the implications for facilitating the parent-child relationship are amazing.


Co-written by Emily Patterson and Kathleen Thomas


Emily and Kathleen are Communications Coordinators for the Austin child care facility, a member of the AdvancED® accredited family of Primrose Schools (located in 16 states throughout the U.S.) and part of the network of child care preschools delivering progressive, early childhood, Balanced Learning® curriculum.

The Twizzles turned 3 and go to School :-)

It was a great day on November 18, 2010.  The Twizzles woke up, and had their first day of school.

The school is so beautiful.  Of course, they walked in they had been going to school there for months.  I wanted to be there so bad, but SuperDad took so many pictures for me to relive the whole thing.

After their long first day of school (3 hours), we had cupcakes for them waiting at home.  Some people think The Twizzles have beautiful BIG eyes.  Seeing those eyes looking at the cupcakes were the cutest thing.

Scary Alphabet - ITP, HSP, viral infection, OMG!

This has a been a week of medical acronyms that makes me so happy to have a very attentive husband and a Biomedical Engineer as my best friend.   Techie baby woke up about a week ago in pain.  His legs were hurting really bad, and he couldn't walk much at all.  It really alarmed us!  He was on some new decongestant medication, so we thought that it was related to that.  We stopped that medication, and gave him ibuprofen every 8 hours to combat the pain.  By Sunday, blotches began to appear on his legs, and he was scratching like crazy.  This made me very alarmed, so I started to research.  I found an illness called purpura (bleeding under the skin), and I really didn't want to believe it so I stopped researching.  I called the doctor first thing on Monday, and all of my men went off to the doctor's appointment while I was at work.  My husband promptly called me to tell me ITP was the initial diagnosis.  ITWHAT!  ITP is idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura or immune thrombocytopenic purpura, and the first word has a definitions that no one wants to hear about any illness - without apparent cause; describes a disease or disorder that has no known cause.  Can you believe that?  This was not what I wanted to hear on the call.  So a solution of steriods is pretty much the only solution.  Oh, and OTC pain killers which we were doing already.

At least there was an outcome and a solution, but it was a bit much to digest for a Monday morning.  We just kept him comfortable the whole day.  So, by Tuesday morning, his left eye was almost swollen shut.  I thought maybe a bite, and my husband thought maybe he got something in his eye that irritated it.  We started the pain killer routine, and he started to move around like his independent self.  By Wednesday morning, he woke up with 3 or so huge bumps all over his head.  And, it seemed that he didn't have his balance when he tried to walk.  That sent me into SuperMommie mode.  We started packing up for a day at the hospital.  I sent off necessary emails and texts to make sure people knew what was going on, and sent prayer requests to my warriors.  We took Aaliyah to Kindergarten and headed off to the hospital. 

When we made it to the emergency room, the initial nurse says if his doctor mentioned HSP as a possibility.  We just looked at each other.  Then, the doctor comes in and says the same thing.  We were dumbfounded, and started researching.  I emailed my best friend, and Future started researching on his phone.  HSP is Henoch-Schonlein Purpura (HSP, Anaphylactoid Purpura), and they both said that this is exactly what Frederick was going through over the past few weeks or so.  Henoch-Schonlein purpura (HSP) is a form of blood vessel inflammation or vasculitis. Classically, HSP causes skin rash, pain in the abdomen, and joint inflammation (arthritis). Symptoms usually last approximately a month. Recurrences are not frequent but do occur.

After hearing this, we were a little relieved, but still scared of the acronyms.  Frederick had a CAT scan and was hooked up to an IV.  He didn't like any of that, and I knew that it was going to be tough.  This is a little blessing that has to be fully dressed at all times with even his socks and shoes most days.  For him to just be in underwear with no pool or bath tub was very unnerving.  He finally calmed down after a few minutes of fits, and then he immediately went to sleep in the hospital.  Future and I were relieved again to see him resting comfortably.

Another hour goes by, and the doctor comes back to visit with results.  "Viral Infection" is what he and our pediatrician felt was going on.  The viral infection was triggering his body's inflammatory system to react everywhere.  The inflamed spots were his head, joints, feet, and possibly his ears (Future figured that one out).  All of this means, yet another treatment plan of just pain killers.

I am so happy that God always has a plan.  For the past two months, we have had a lot of ups and downs because of Techie Baby's body just not treating him right.  This is how God's plan works.  We started the process of getting The Twizzles in school recently.  One of those appointments for qualifying for school resulted in a bad hearing exam for Techie Baby.  That hearing exam started a series of appointments that resulted in this viral infection.  If we wouldn't have gotten the bad hearing exam, then we may not have known until too late that whatever virus was taking over our blessing's body.  Thank you God for all that you do!

Mommie's Little Helpers

How many of you are as blessed as I am?  I have four wonderful blessings, bringing up the rear are The Twizzles.  Being my SuperMommie self, my Saturdays are filled with errands, cleaning, washing, organizing, etc.  My blessings are following in my footsteps.  


I started off the day with pillow fluffing and sweeping.  Before I knew it The Twizzles decided they wanted to vacuum and sweep.  Princess Liyah wanted to fluff, and my oldest, Tonee, had already starting blessing us with her culinary arts of cooking breakfast and cleaning the kitchen.  Giving your blessings these skills early can seem to be breaking child labor laws to some, but I think that if you don't teach your blessings early how to 

1. Help you and your family by giving a helping hand, 
2. Showing that you love your family by giving a helping hand,
3. Being a productive citizen at home and in the real word by doing your part,
4. Earn respect and achievement by giving a hand instead of having a hand out

they will not be productive in life, and feel that they are entitled to things instead of feeling that they have earned things. I really have an issue with blessings children feeling that they are entitled for things instead of trying to work for it.  You see I changed my normal word to children.  When they are doing the steps above, I consider them blessings.

Our First of Many Fishing Trips

The Twizzles, and the rest of the family, went on our first fishing trip in July along with Grandpa of course.  Dad has only been fishing once, so Grandpa, was "teacher of the year" this day.  He was so excited to share something he loves to much with his grandkids.  I used to go when I was little, but it has been a long time for me.  I was so excited about this that we had to run to Wal-Mart of all kinds of gear on Friday night.  Grandpa laughed so hard on Saturday when he saw all of it.

Both boys taking turns with the fishing pole.

Future smiling a little too hard.

Frederick not understanding why a picture is needed.

Aaliyah running to me to get bread so that she can feed the ducks.  Yes, she dropped her special princess fishing pole to the ground fast to come feed the ducks.  HILARIOUS!

It was a great Saturday for everyone, and I have been told that everybody is getting fishing pole so that we can do this all over again.  Question: who is going to put the night crawler on the hook?  We'll see how many run away from that job :-)

More from the photoshoot with a Big Sis Included...

Photoshoot with Kechi

We had a great photo session with Kechi of Kechimage.  Here are a few shots of The Twizzles at 2 and a half in their first professional photo shoot.  Aren't they cute!  There are many more to come like this.

 

 

 

 

Typical Twizzle Day

Our little blessings are officially men.  Talkie Baby aka Future is now trying to potty standing up.  I was not ready for this, but I figured it would be him.  He was first to "master" potty training.  Now, I need someone to buy me a really big house that has two toilets in every bathroom right next to each other.  And, I am not talking about a bidet.  I need full toilets :-) so they can sit side-by-side, and sing to each other.  Someone, please tell me why singing on the toilet is therapeutic to my blessings. 

Now, on to our Typical Twizzle Day.  Usually, when I get home from work, I try to drop everything, and start teaching/playing/coloring/dancing/talking with the blessings (all three).  Princess Liyah makes me look good online :-)  She takes care of my pets in Fishville and Petsville.  I have found something that we both can do together.  I am really teaching her how to navigate through a computer with a mouse, trackball and everything.  It is just facinating to see her use the computer, and the best part is to be asked "Are the fish hungry today?" when I get home.

This is what the Twizzles do :-) They lay on the couch backwards waiting on the camera to snap.  Gotta love them.

 

And bringing up the rear...

Less than a month after his brother, Frederick decided that it was his turn to be potty trained.  The wild part is that both of them were potty trained before their big sister was potty trained.  Happy Raise to our household budget now.

Here is Future's Potty Award (March 28):

Welcome to the Potty Awards. And the Award goes to Future Angelo Lilly III aka Talkie Baby aka Twizzle #1 aka Frick aka Goodness aka Blessing #3 for his accomplishment of BEING POTTY TRAINED! He would like to thank his Dad Future first and foremost because without him, he couldn't have done it. He would also like to thank his big sister and his mom for their "encouragement".

Here is Frederick's Potty Award (April 11th):

We are back from our commercial break to the Potty Awards. The Award goes to Frederick Douglas Lilly III aka Techie Baby aka Twizzle #2 aka Frack aka Gracious aka Blessing #4 for BEING POTTY TRAINED! He would like to thank his Dad Future first and foremost as well. And thanks to his Mom Katinya for helping him "get his point across" since his Techie language has not been translated yet for us mere mortals.

Potty Training on the go!

We have one down and one to go. Can you imagine this? We have been battling with The Twizzles to use the pottys that are dead center in the living room. Frederick will go as long as you FORCE him to sit on the pot. Future thinks that it is just "blasphemy" that we would ask him to relieve himself on such a thing, or so we thought.

Of course everyone says that twins have their own language. Well, that doesn't work for parents during potty training. We were not getting the signs that Future was giving for about a week until we had to travel this weekend. By the morning that we were about to travel for 2 1/2 hours back home, we got it! He finally trained us.

Future only wanted to sit on the potty when he really needed to go. He didn't want to sit on there all the time. (check: we got it) Also, the circumstances have to be optimal to allow him to go. (check: we got that one as well) So, on Saturday and Sunday, Future Angelo Lilly III had only 1 accident, and it was not his fault.

To a 2 year old, day and night are the same. Accident 1: he woke up around 3 in the morning squirming like crazy in the bed with us. We thought he was having night terrors. Finally he stopped squirming, and then a warm feeling came across me. I jumped up and apologized to him over and over because he had an accident. Then, I changed him, me, and part of the bed, and we went back to sleep. We have been teaching them to let us know when they need to "go". That means day or night. After changing him at 4 in the morning, he didn't wet his diaper again. It was dry for 1.5 more days. Then, it just couldn't be removed and put back on any more.

While we were on the road, I just hoped that he wouldn't start squirming in his chair because we couldn't force him to go before we started driving. We were 10 miles away from home, and the squirming began. We went another 5 miles, and "hightailed" it into the nearest restaurant. Dad took him to the restroom. When they came out, we were jumping, screaming, and congratulating him all the way to the car. This is a small feat to some, but monumental to a parent that would love a Diaper Raise in their pocketbook.

Now, on to Twizzle #2 who is perfectly fine sitting on the pot all day long. So, the differences in them is that Future aka Baby A aka Talkie Baby can clearly say "I need peepee." Frederick aka Baby B aka Techie Baby would just as soon text you that information than tell you. I guess I need to get him a cell phone through his turn at potty training.

Dedicated to the Lord

Frederick and Future were dedicated to the Lord on Sunday, March 14th. They were so overwhelmed by the lights, people, and everything. We have seen many blessings get dedicated in the past, and some had "melt downs" on stage. I prayed that we didn't have any of that for us. We didn't, but I swear they looked like "deers in headlights".

A Day at the Park

My kiddos have had "cabin fever" this whole winter basically because TEXAS HAD IT'S FIRST FEVER IN AGES this year.  That just really didn't sit well with this "Summer Baby" over  here.  At the first "crack" of good weather, I took all of the kids to the park for a few minutes in between errands. It was so much fun to see all of them running around and playing.  I never thought that the Twizzles would be running around as much as they did.  I really have boys at home now.  We got out of the car, and they almost immediately started running in opposite directions for the biggest slides that they could find.  It was awesome to see how much fun they had.  I almost hated to leave, but Princess Liyah decided she needed to "potty".  We had no options there.

 

Bumps, bruises, and booboos

I am really not used to having boys yet, and especially not having twin boys.  "They are a handful" is an extreme understatement.  What surprises me is the number of bumps, bruises, and booboos that two boys can get.  We have had chipped teeth, busted lips (cut all the way through just last night), knots on their heads, and so much more; and they are only 27 months old.  You would swear that we were inflicting pain intentionally on our children, and this is so not true.  I was impelled to write this because my husband said a weird statement to me after we finally got the bleeding to stop last night.  "They are going to get uglier."  That has been playing over and over in my mind for the past 12 hours.  I can't stop thinking about how I want their cherub faces to stay exactly like they are now.  Oh well, Boys will be Boys.

Have you ever been licked?

I figure that most of you would say "Yes, but this is a Rated G Blog".  Well, it is Rated G because it isn't what you think.

I went out of town for almost 3 whole days this past week.  This was my first trip away from The Twizzles since I was carrying them.  It was a little bit harder for me this time around than the past trips that I have taken, and I am not for sure why.  I called them every night, but the last night they decided that they didn't want to talk on the phone.  I was not a "happy camper" about that one bit, but then they finally got on the phone.

The cutest sound in the world is hearing your two babies saying, "Hewwo Mommie" in stereo.  I loved it and hated it, so I was really ready to get home and hold them.  I drove into the garage like normal, and I eased into the house without anyone hearing me.  Then, I said "Mommie's Home".  You would have thought that someone won a Gold at the Olympics.  They started screaming and yelling my name.  Then, I was licked...  Frederick (Techie Baby) grabbed my neck and started chanting "Up Up Up".  Then, I felt a weird sensation.  Future (Talkie Baby) grabbed my leg, and started to lick me.  I can't even explain it, but I think that he was acting as a doggie before I got home is all that I can imagine.  It was hilarious because he licked my leg, arm, face, and then I finally got him to stop.

Suffice it to say, getting licked in this fashion was fantastic.

Snow Day 2010

Wild and Crazy Evening

Well, we started potty training when the Twizzles turned 2.  It has been an big roller coaster with them considering they are so individual.  One could sit on the potty for almost a whole hour without letting out anything, while the other one "let's it all out".

We made headway by accident this week.  The boys sat on the potties for about 30 minutes or so.  Since they didn't "produce" anything, I decided to let them take a bath.  I didn't want to put a diaper on them to take them upstairs, so I decided to put them on underwear.  Between the den and the tub upstairs, both had accidents in their underwear.  They started screaming and crying as if they were hurting.  It scared me at first because I couldn't tell if they were really hurting or not.

I talked to a few other mommies about this, and they all say the same thing.  If we had known that the fact that our blessings being dirty would trigger the need to "potty" on a toilet, then I would have let them "roam free" a long time ago.  I am okay with mopping for a few weeks if that would get me a raise by not buying diapers, I AM ALL FOR IT.

and the vocabulary begins...

The Twizzles are officially talking.  "Where is Momma?" was said by Baby Boy this morning.  It was so clear, and it really makes you think about how good God is.  They are almost 26 months old, and the sentences have not been too clear up until now. I can't imagine what the next couple of months are going to be like with two little people talking ALL DAY AND NIGHT.  I mean, I have heard their discussions on the monitor at night, but now they will be coherent discussions in the dark.  They are so funny because they are comfortable to play and talk in the dark.  My aunt tried to get Baby Boy out of the washroom one day by "scaring" him.  She thought that if she almost closed the door and turned out the light, he would cry and ask to come out.  She got a completely the opposite response from him.