Dr. Jenn Berman, award-winning columnist, professional therapist, and mother of twins, shares simple tips, tools and techniques for encouraging your child’s optimal development in her new book, SuperBaby: 12 Ways to Give Your Child a Head Start in the First 3 Years. We really like this book (and we like that Rachel is quoted in it, too) – so we are sharing a review of it here.

Save on SuperBaby when you purchase the Baby Sign Language Starter Kit!

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When Sara Nelson Cosmi made this post on our Facebook page, she grabbed our attention!

I just wanted to share a quick story. My husband is a firefighter/EMT and went on a call last night to a house with hearing impaired patients. He was able to communicate with them, asking them “where does it hurt” and spelling out simple words all from watching Baby Signing Time with our daughter. It’s really neat to know that not only is Signing Time teaching our children but we gain from it as well. It encourages us to keep learning ASL and hopefully our children will continue to learn it as a second language. Thank You!

• Tell us about your family. How did you get started with signing?
  Jeff and I married about 5 and 1/2 years ago and moved from Portland, OR to a little town just North called La Center. We both actually work in Longview, WA, Jeff as a firefighter and I am a letter carrier with the USPS. When we were pregnant with our daughter we were already talking about trying to teach her some basic signs.  Neither Jeff or I knew any signs, I think I remembered part of the alphabet from when I was in elementary school but that was all we knew. We had heard that signing really helped communication and that Lily would benefit from it in so many ways. So we bought a basic sign with your baby book. After Lillian was born a couple people had told us about baby signing time, so we bought the first volume to try it out. Lily loved watching baby signing time, she quickly learned a few signs and we bought volumes 2 and 3. By a year and a half Lily was a signing machine (we aren’t biased or anything).  Me and Jeff were learning a lot too, it was really cool, we knew animals and foods and colors! Lillian is now 2 1/2 and has a baby brother, Baker, who we are turning onto the DVDs. Lily sings the songs to him and is a big help in trying to teach him.
• So what happened when your husband went out on the call you posted about?
  A drunk driver had crashed into the side of someone’s house in the middle of the night and landed in a gentleman’s bedroom. The man, his wife and their daughter were all hearing impaired. When Jeff arrived on scene he found out that the family was deaf and asked the man, in sign language, “Where does it hurt?” The man promptly showed him and after they got him stable, Jeff asked, “Where is your I.D?” by signing ‘where’ and then spelling out I.D. The family was able to communicate really well, Jeff said that they were able to read lips fairly well and that they had paper and pens to write stuff out, too. The paramedics came and took over with the gentleman (he was the one in the bed when the car came through the wall) and Jeff tried talking with the wife a bit. She asked him to tell her husband to call on his phone when he got to the hospital and Jeff was able to do so.
• What was your husband’s reaction to this?
  Jeff doesn’t really feel like he did anything special. He was able to make some people feel more comfortable because he was able to communicate, however small it may have been, with them at a difficult time and it was all from watching Baby Signing Time with our daughter. Jeff never thought that he would need to use signing on the job but was excited to be able to and is ready to learn more.
• How else has signing impacted your family?
  It is really neat to us to be at a gathering or a restaurant and be able to communicate across the room. Or for us to look across the playground and tell Lily to ‘share with her friend’ or ask her to say please. Signing is an awesome way to communicate and we are anxious to learn more. Thank you for helping our family open our eyes to another world..signing!

Your votes are in! Here are the official top 10 Signing Time gifts for 2011:

1. Baby Signing Time Full Collection
2. All of the Signing Time Products!
3. Baby Signing Time, Vol. 1
   
4. Potty Time
5. Series 1, Vol. 7: Leah’s Farm
6. Series 1 Full Collection
7. Signing Time Board Books
8. Series 2, Vol. 2: Happy Birthday to You
9. Classroom Edition
10. Flash Cards

I love giving Baby Signing Time as a baby gift. It introduces them to the whole line of great products! – Chana Posen

I love to give Signing Time to moms in public!! When people see my daughter sign and are amazed, I tell them all about Signing Time as if I were a door to door salesman!! We keep some Signing Time DVDs in the car for long trips and I have left them as tips at restaurants, and given them away at grocery stores!! My most recent gifting was to a woman that I met at the grocery store. Both she and her husband are deaf, but have a son who hears. She had never heard of Signing Time, and she is having trouble getting her son to sign. I gave her all of our Baby Signing Time DVDs (My daughter has outgrown them.) And he is beginning to sign! It brings tears to my eyes when I hear of a child learning to sign, It’s like an angel who has gotten their wings!!! – Katie Ralston-Litmer

Leah’s Farm is the hit in our house! The music, along with the signs are just perfect for our little one. She loves Rachel! Our daughter really thinks she will meet her and loves to call her on the Potty Time app. If you don’t have Potty Time, it’s awesome! I suggest a bundle of Everyday Signs, Leah’s Farm and Potty Time. – Jennifer Pedersen

I would love to give Baby Signing Time to everyone! I’m a mom to a child with unilateral hearing loss and speech delay and Baby Signing Time and Signing Time (and now Potty Time!) have made a huge difference in my daughter’s ability to communicate, both in ASL and expressive speech. I think it would be awesome if states sent every new baby a copy of Baby Signing Time, whether they are born in a hospital, birthing center, or at home. Baby carriers and Baby Signing Time are my favorite gifts to give new parents! – Jennifer Pummell Hamner

Learning ASL through watching Signing Time Series One with my daughter has helped me to communicate better with her and her cousins. They are all toddlers. It is much easier to understand their speech when they sign while talking. The videos in Series One have also really helped increase my daughter and nephew’s vocabulary. – Julia Pitt

There is no one product that is best, just the noise I heard from my autistic son at age 5 when he said his first words when watching Signing Time. – John-Erica Belcher

I would love to give the Signing Time Classroom Edition to Primrose Elementary School in Shelburne, Ont. The kindergarten teacher is learning and teaching both her classes signs so they can communicate with their deaf classmate. – Marla Kozak

If you’ve ever watched a Signing Time or Baby Signing Time DVD, you know how easy it is for the songs to get stuck in your head. Sometimes I find myself in the grocery store singing, “It’s Signing Time with Alex and Leah; it’s Signing Time with Alex and Leah…come and play!”  People look at me funny, but I just can’t help it. I love these songs! If you love these songs, too, and want to share the words with others so they can sing along with you, download the lyrics here:

Baby Signing Time Lyrics

Signing Time Series 1 Lyrics

Signing Time Series 2 Lyrics

We celebrated Earth Day by making our popular lyric pages more earth-friendly. That means the next time you want to print the words to your favorite Signing Time song, you have the option of downloading the black-and-white edition, or a color edition. Whichever you choose, you will cut down on the amount of ink you’ll need for printing.

We have song lyrics for:

• Signing Time Series 1 Songs (updated)
• Signing Time Series 2 Songs (new)
• Baby Signing Time Songs

Download them now!