Sign Language for Bible Verses

[happy@home]

Good morning, ladies!!

My dc will be doing Beyond in the fall and I was drooling over my Beyond Manual in advance!!

In the Bible Study box it says to add hand motions to the verses to help the children remember the words. This is not one of my strong points so I thought it would be neat if we could "sign" the verse! Do any of you do this? Do you have any suggestions for a Sign Language Program. My dc are 6 (in 2 wks) and 7 years old. We could begin to learn the signs now and continue over the summer to possibly be ready to use them with Beyond this fall.

Any suggestions are welcome!! Even ideas other than sign language! Thank you all in advance!

I just have to say how COOL it is to be able to ask other "like-minded" moms for help and ideas!! I don't have any other homeschoolers nearby and no one else at our church homeschools either. It seems we are surrounded by public schools teachers who take offense that we think we can do a better job with our children at home!

Have a great Friday!!

[mamayi]

We are using Beyond this year and LOVE it!
I really like your idea for using real sign language (I assume you mean ASL) with the Bible verses! I hope that someone can point to a good resource as our family would like that too.

I will say that my dc have come up with some very good motions to go with the verses all on their own. Sometimes what they come up with sticks with them better than what "mom" does!
And of course they have no problem singing the songs that correspond with the verse. We love that cd.

Can't wait to hear other's responses too!
Andrea

[learningathome]

I bought a couple books a few years ago that I have found helpful. Signing for Kids by Mickey Flodin has a lot of signs common to daily usage, plus a chapter about religious signs. Carson-Dellosa has a series of books called "Signing God's Word". The one I have is called Jesus Loves Me! and it illustrates signs for 29 verses about love, plus three songs about Jesus' love. I know that there are at least 2 other books in the series, though the titles escape my memory. ASL really comes in handy for those times that we can't think of a good action.

Hope that helps!
Heidi

[happy@home]

Thanks ladies!! Does anyone know of a dvd that is geared toward younger kiddos?

[Shimmer]

I've been using ASL for our bible verses this year. We do signs for several of the words in the verse, but I don't rearrange the verse to fit a ASL translation so we can still speak it normally. I think it helps them build their sign vocabulary and we can work towards conversing in sign when they are older if they are interested.

I use http://www.aslpro.com to get the signs from their online video dictionary. It has worked well enough for our purposes. They even have a religious dictionary on there.

For a video series, I HIGHLY recommend Signing Time by Rachel Coleman. There are 12 volumes in Series 1 that are really good for building sing vocabulary. They are intended for ages 0-8, but I think they are great for all ages. She has some great music and you get to see the signs over and over to grasp it. We have one of the CDs and my girls do the signs to the songs in the car. Very fun! Our Library has the videos so check your local one. They can probably get it on interlibrary loan. I'd start with something in 4-12 (you don't have to go in order). The first three were done before Signing Time got really big so they aren't as professional looking. http://www.signingtime.com

[happy@home]

Thanks, Shimmer!! I'll check into those! I am just a "gotta see it done" kinda gal!!