ABSTRACT
Twenty years ago, when I was lucky to be a research assistant in Ursula Bellugi’s lab at
The Salk Institute, I noticed certain errors that young children made in sign formation. I
particularly remember watching one old reel-to-reel videotape that showed a Deaf child
producing a rendition of the sign GUM. The child’s hand made appropriate contact at the
cheek, but the movement was driven entirely from the shoulder. In contrast, the adult
H-hand sign (first and second fingers extended) is articulated with a bending movement
at the second knuckle of the extended fingers. A little library research even let me put
errors like this one in context: In the development of motor skills, children show a
tendency to proximalize movement. In other words, they tend-in movements of the legs
and arms-to use articulators that are closer to the torso than an adult would use. I noted
a few examples of early signs that seemed to fit this pattern, and then stored the mental
and physical 35 cards away. The mental note stuck with me. The actual 35 card seems to have been lost in some move.
