Needs, emotions… How to talk to your baby with signs?

How to express yourself without words?

Ask for water, a hug, his comforter?

Thanks to the signs adapted to the needs of babies.

Isabelle Cottenceau discovered this way of communicating with a baby at the age of 15, when she was an au pair and took care of a baby, hearing but with whom her parents exchanged thanks to a few rudimentary signs... and very practical !

Having become a professional in early childhood, then a specialist in baby sign language, she has made many families benefit from this novelty.

"The idea is to offer the baby the opportunity to express his needs and his feelings before speaking," sums up the author of a dozen books on the subject.

To offer benevolent support and consider the baby as a whole.

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“With my third child, I started at birth”

A technique that she has tested and refined both as an Early Childhood professional, therefore, and as a mother of three children.

"I didn't do it with my eldest," she explains.

But when I had my second, which was crying a lot, I was in trouble.

When he was thirteen months old, I remembered that baby signs had helped me as a young girl to a father.

It was a relief, we felt more serene.

Beyond the signs, I placed myself differently, placed at his height, more poised.

With my third child, I started at birth.

Because this way of exchanging is very interesting before speaking.

But also afterwards.

“The vocabulary of emotions can remain for a long time in the life of the child, who finds it difficult to manage his emotions.

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Training for parents and professionals

Today, Isabelle is totally dedicated to her Eveil et Signes training center, which offers workshops for parents and training for professionals.

Little by little, this new way of communicating with babies is gaining ground, both in homes and in nurseries, and even some pediatric hospitals.

On the occasion of the release of her book on

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interviewed Isabelle on video.

History to make known the essential signs to the parents.

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