Signing Savvy, Your Sign Language Resource

Every year around this time, I get a message or two from teachers and interpreters of deaf children asking how to best convey the concept of rhymes to their students.  Rhyming is a very common curriculum goal in many, if not all early childhood education programs throughout the United States and Canada. The problem often with rhyming is that many of the words are made-up and, therefore, they have no sign.  We all know that words that have no sign should ...

Being an educator of deaf children for over twenty years, I know the frustrations that occur when you are working with a student and continue to find gaps in their understanding of certain concepts. It’s shocking to find out that your second grader doesn’t know something like their middle name or their address. It’s easy to say to yourself, “Why didn’t the parents or the teachers before me teach this child this information?”   Instead of pointing fingers, there is a ...

Summer is HERE!  For most children this means a break from school and fun in the sun with long summer days playing with friends.  Unfortunately, for many deaf and hard of hearing children, these weeks away from school can mean days without good communication. They will still have great summer days of play with friends and picnics with family, but often times communicating at home can be more of a struggle than at school – signing skills may not be ...

  We have had many people ask about signing THANK YOU to family and friends, and also giving thanks to God during this holiday season. In the case of THANK YOU to family and friends (or kind strangers!), you will want to sign the normal thank you gesture by moving your open flat hand out and down from your face, but do so in the direction of the person you are thanking.  You can remember the sign for thank you because it ...

Acceptance and being included is something all of us want in life. Think of growing up and some of the crazy things we did in order to fit in or be part of the group. For many deaf and hard of hearing children, the idea of being the part of a group is something they long for but it is difficult to have happen because of limited communication.   In my several years of teaching deaf and hard of hearing children I ...

With Halloween next week, the countdown to Halloween has officially begun! We asked everyone on our Signing Savvy Facebook Page what their favorite "seasonal signs" are. And the survey says… skeleton spider scary fireworks pumpkin ghost Check out the Sign of the Day from now to Halloween to see each of these signs featured as we countdown to Halloween. Join the conversation on our Signing Savvy Facebook Page or tell us your favorite seasonal sign for Halloween by leaving a comment ...

I know, you never thought you would hear me ("The Man in the Blue Shirt") say that deaf children are signing too much, right?  Well I say it only in perspective of comparing their signing skills to their writing skills. I think there are often times in the field of Deaf Education that the parents, teachers and interpreters that are working with the deaf and hard of hearing population are just so excited that the children are beginning to express themselves ...

Sign language is not a universal language. Unfortunately sign language is NOT universal throughout the world. There is American Sign Language, British Sign Language, Spanish Sign Language, Japanese Sign Language, Ausian (Australian Sign Language) and many more. In fact, there are even multiple sign languages used in the United States (American Sign Language, Signed Exact English, regional dialects, etc.). Although one universal sign language would probably make things easier, just like with spoken language, the world would have a very difficult ...

Raising a young child in this day and age of fast paced life is difficult. It is hard to keep up with the excitement of animated video games and television shows, which often times are not displaying the behavior or teaching the lessons that we want our young children to learn and emulate. This is why we at Signing Savvy are very proud to have a partnership with an animation company, called WonderGrove Kids, that’s primary focus is to take the ...

I have had several questions about how to teach young children to sign recently, so I wanted to repost an article I wrote back in 2009 (with a few modifications), which answers many of the questions. Research has shown that a child's muscles in the hands and fingers develop at a faster rate than those in the mouth and jaw. This shows us that a child is better equipped at a young age to sign before they can speak. And children ...