Hello List:

I went to a party over the 4th of July (in the Washington, D.C. area) and
got reacquainted with an old friend, his wife and their new baby.  I was
surprised to learn that his daughter, an infant of 11 months, was learning
American Sign Language.  She could sign for milk, sleepy, play, leave, and
was asking to be taught more words daily.  At the party, she was indicating
that she wanted to know the sign for squirrel.  Amazing.

"It's all the rage in California," my friend said, explaining that children
under the age of two can learn as many as 100 words in American Sign
Language; yet most learn to speak more slowly - i.e. language acquisition
is slower.  This is partly explained by the difficulties of speech
mechanics and forming certain consonant and vowel sounds.  He went on to
say that there were studies that showed that children learning ASL at a
very young age scored higher on IQ tests at the age of eight than children
that did not learn ASL, but what he and his wife were more excited about
was being able to communicate with their daughter instead of just trying to
guess what she wanted.

I found a recent article in the Denver Post about this trend.  I think its
really cool.
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E53%257E731449,00.html

It seems that having an inclusive lifestyle - a lifestyle embracing the
diversity of various accessibility to content - can enriches all our lives
in way we never imagined.

Joy Gatewood Fulton
Senior Systems Developer
Altarum
www.altarum.org
703-914-5105
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