 In the late 1980's, Joseph Garcia, a student at the University of Alaska, became fascinated with sign language and decided to study it seriously. Once he had a solid grasp of American Sign Language (ASL), Garcia made a number of friends in the deaf community. This resulted in an observation that changed his life - and the lives of many to come.
An Interesting Observation…
What Joseph Garcia noticed was that the hearing babies of his deaf friends were on their way to becoming sign language "experts" at around 9 months of age. Yet the 9-month old babies of his hearing friends were not communicating much at all. The difference intrigued Garcia so much that he made it the subject of his Master's thesis.
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Why was it possible, he asked, for babies around 9 months of age to communicate by gesturing, but not by speaking?
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And if deaf parents could communicate with their hearing babies, would there be any benefit to teaching sign language to the hearing children of hearing parents? |
Using his infant sons as "test subjects," Garcia was able to demonstrate the positive effects of signing with hearing babies in his thesis. Eventually, it evolved into his popular program, " Sign With Your Baby." We'll discuss the benefits of his program later in this module.
The Women's Perspective...
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nterested in learning what signing with your baby is all about? You've come to the right place. First we'll take a look at how the idea began - and then we'll review the programs that can teach you how. Ready to begin? 
