"ALL DONE"

 This is Kai's "All Done" sign

 

 

Several months ago I realized that Kai needs a way to communicate to other people.   As I have mentioned in previous post, forming words is difficult for him.     I have been working hard to try to sign with him as much as I possibly can and he is catching on to it.   His most recent sign is “Medicine”.   He will sign medicine and remind ME in the morning that he has to take it.   Another sign that he recently mastered is "eat".   He looks me directly in the eye with a little cutie smirk signing "eat" and making sure that I sign back to him.  You can tell he is bursting with pride.   He loves for me to sign him the alphabet and to count up to ten.  I have been teaching myself sign language through the Signing Times DVD’s.   I have taken one class previously that taught the first 100 words that a child signs.   I am also going to take a class in the fall that is taught by the Metro Deaf School.   The fact of the matter is that I need to immerse myself/our family into the Deaf Culture if we are ever going to use American Sign Language fluently.   We need to begin going to Deaf events and surrounding ourselves with people that use American Sign Language. To be honest, getting involved with the Deaf community is so out of my comfort zone that I have to push myself to get involved in the events.   My analogy I thought of is if one day you woke up and realized, in order to communicate with your child you need to become involved with the Hmong community.   The first thing you need to do is find out where the events in the community are and find that person that is willing to take the time with you and your extremely poor and sometimes unrecognizable language as you try to speak Hmong.   All while you are trying not to insult their culture since you know very little of their social norms.  

 I'm nervous/scared of the unknown of getting involved in the Deaf community, however, I believe the return will be ten-fold for Kai's development, our relationship and his overall success.