[lg policy] Does Baby Sign Language Help Second Language Acquisition?

[Anthea Fraser Gupta]

I have also been interested by this promotion and actually set an essay on it for my child language acquisition class. There are some good public information sites available, including a very balanced discussion from the UK's National Literacy Trust:
http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/talktoyourbaby/signing.html

We shouldn't think of baby sign as the same as acquiring a signed language alongside English: the babies are taught some signed words, and the aim is to get the production of the first words earlier than they are in oral languages. They are not learning ASL or BSL. I am not convinced by the arguments, or by the evidence, which is not based on valid comparisons (and is written by partisans), but anything that makes parents attentive to babies is going to enrich their development. 

I can't see that it would have any effect on a child growing up with two native languages (as in the question) and I also can't see that it would have any effect on later acquisition or learning of other languages, except that parents who sign up for baby sign classes are the keen types who want to see their children do well and are likely to have the qualities that make for achieving children.

Anthea

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Anthea Fraser Gupta (Dr)
School of English, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT
<www.leeds.ac.uk/english/staff/afg>
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