You were at a barbeque, pre-kids, and Matt & Sarah are telling you how they are using sign language to communicate with their baby. It peaks your interest, you think that’s pretty cool, so you park it in your head for later. Then, baby comes along. You decide it’s time to do a bit of Googling, so you type: baby sign language or infants and sign language. You are pleasantly surprised by the huge array of free stuff online. But there’s only one catch. You don’t realise that it’s all American. You don’t even know that there are different sign language all over the world. You don’t know that Australia has it’s very own sign language – Auslan!

If this is you. You are not alone. You are definitely not the first person to do this, nor will you be the last. But I am on a mission to raise awareness around this. I’d love for it to be common knowledge that there are different sign languages all over the world and Australian Sign Language – known as Auslan – is our very own, unique, beautiful version.

Now, maybe you know enough about signing with an infant to understand how it works and are thinking: it doesn’t really matter!

There is some truth in that. The benefit of signing will be the same regardless of which signs you choose to use with your baby, whether American Sign Language (ASL), Australian Sign Language or any other sign language from around the world. But I also ask: why not use Auslan? I mean we are Australian. Learning Auslan with your baby means that you can both enjoy the amazing benefits of using sign with them as a baby (read about those benefits here) and your both learning a transferable skill that can be used throughout life!

What are the key take aways?

1) There are hundreds of different sign languages all over the world!

2) In Australia our sign language is called Auslan.

3) If you are going to learn a sign language to help with communication, check it’s origin and choose a local sign language!

Happy signing :)

Meg