A motivating sign is one which your baby wants to learn and perform. Signs are motivating when they represent a favourite toy or activity, a tasty snack, or a special person in your baby’s life.
Our little fella loves food. He’s always been a good eater and he will eat almost anything, from jerk chicken to Brussels sprouts. He not only has a sweet tooth (which we only occasionally indulge), but a spicy tooth and a sour tooth as well! He’ll even eat garlic powder all on its own!
While mealtime obviously provides opportunity to practice signs for different foods, creating a scrapbook with photographs allows us to practice any time throughout the day. Our son really enjoys books and he will ask us to read with him all the time. Having a personalized scrapbook gives him the chance to see things he likes out of context and provides him with extra practice performing the signs for them and see us perform them too.
I have also created a scrapbook of family members that has allowed us to practice saying their names and doing signs. He doesn’t get to see some of them very often, so it has been a way to keep in touch too. When we have visited, many of his relatives have been amazed that he remembers who they are and what their names are!
Our son is highly motivated by vehicles; so of course, I made him a scrapbook of our family car and van, his uncle’s pick-up, and various large construction and emergency vehicles too. He loves it and is eager to do the signs for each!
Homemade scrapbooks can give you a chance to show your baby that you are listening to what he is interested in. They will allow you to not only share more signing time with your baby, but more talking time as well. They will undoubtedly become some of your baby’s favourite books that he will return to again and again.