(Facts and figures taken from original study by Drs. Linda Acredolo and Susan Goodwyn).

Many people are sceptical about baby signing, however we feel the following statistics speak for themselves:

• At 24 months, signing-babies were found to talk on average more like 27- or 28-month-olds. This represents more than a three-month advantage over the non-signing babies.

• In addition, the 24-month-old signing babies were putting together significantly longer sentences.

• At 36 months the signing-babies on average were talking like 47-month-olds, putting them almost a full year ahead of their average age-mates.

• By the age of eight, children who had learned to sign as babies had an average IQ of 114 compared to an IQ of 102 for those that didn't.