Dayton Daily News |
by Dale Huffman 
August 26, 2001

Signing Babies into Life

     Is it possible your baby can learn to communicate with you by using sign language before learning to utter first words like mama and dada? 

     Kathryn "Kathy" Kronz Faber thinks so.

     A graduate of Beavercreek High School in 1985, Kathy has done research and testing and produced a video called Baby See 'N Sign for parents of (newborn) babies.

     "It really works,"  Kathy said.  I knew that sign language has been introduced in a clinical setting at Ohio State University to babies as young as nine months.    Some of the babies learned to use sign language to say things such as "all done, now, five minutes, juice and sleep."

     She added, "The babies are healthy and normal and the sign language is introduced to give them an earlier chance to clearly communicate what is on their tiny minds."

     For Kathy, the first exposure to American Sign Language was in elementary school in Beavercreek when her younger sister, Elizabeth "Lizzy" Kronz, who is now 31, was presented with ASL instruction.

     "Lizzy is dealing with Downs Syndrome, is largely non-verbal, and we all tried to learn ASL with the use of crude drawings and graphics, " Kathy said.  "It was frustrating and even back then I knew there had to be an easier way to learn."

     Kathy earned her degree at the Arizona State University School of Journalism and took a job in an advertising agency  (educational company/EMG).  She and her husband, Eric, were married in 1993.

     "Then we got smart," Kathy Said.  "We dropped out of our high stress jobs and took a farm just outside Eugene, Ore.  Eric raises  mushrooms and organic foods and I concentrate on our children, and work on the educational videos."

     It was in 1999, after the birth of her first son, Nicholas, who is now 2, that Kathy said she began thinking seriously about the notion of communicating with her son through the use of sign language.

     She studied the research done at Ohio Stateâs Rogers Infant-Toddler Laboratory School that indicated infants had learned some signs.

     Armed with a burning desire to communicate with Nicholas, Kathy began teaching him and he responded at about 10 1/2 months, she said.  The first sign her son used was "light" she said.  "He let me know he wanted a light turned on in the ceiling fan."

     Kathy and Nicholas continue to learn ASL together, and even though he can now talk, "I believe he talks as well as he does as a result of signing with him."

     Her daughter, Daphne, who is now 10 months old, is just beginning to sign.

     The narrator and instructor of Kathyâs Baby See 'N Sign video is Johanna Lason-Muhr, signing instructor at the University of Oregon.  In the video, Larson-Muhr explains that she has deaf parents and that signing was her first language.

     She explains in the introduction, "I have taught my two hearing children to sign.  This can open up a whole new world of communication.  As you learn to sign, b patient.  Do not make up signs.  Use the tried and true ASL signs.  It can be simple and fun.  Signing is a natural language."

     Kathy, who is expecting again in February, said that the videos are selling well at $14.99.  She dedicated the project to her mother, Laura Kronz, in Beavercreek with the words, "Thanks for your love and support I couldnât have done it without you."

     Now, she says , she is working on a second volume to promote advanced concepts and words for older kids.

     "This is a labor of love and I only wish my sister Liz could have learned this gift of communication at a much earlier age."
 
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