Signing with Infants: Parental and Caregiver Perceptions and Reported Use
The direct use of signing with an infant can offer communicative exchanges between adults and children, creating effective bonds between child and teacher or child and parent, thereby easing communications and interactions. Infant signing is an established method of communication between parents and young children, even within early childhood centers. Parents and teachers have used signing techniques in order to encourage the preverbal to communicate through gestures and nonverbal signs. The extant literature has documented parents and teachers' use of signs, the current level of interest in infant signing at the Child and Family Research Center [CFRC] located at the University of Nevada, Reno has only recently investigated this type of communication. It was necessary to gain data on the topic because it will offer information to teachers about parents' use and perceptions related to signing actions and activities with their infants. Through the collection of parent and teacher surveys, reported use and perceptions of signing with infants, those between 0 and 24 months, were analyzed from multiple CFRC sites. Based on the data, parents and teachers at the CFRC reported positive perceptions of signing and use it daily to weekly.
childcare centers, infant sign language, parents, perceptions, teachers
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