Should a child with an implant learn to sign?

That's the question posed to a group of experts. Their opinions, based on recent research, are in the most recent edition of the journal Pediatrics. Their conclusion: “The benefits of learning sign language clearly outweigh the risks. For parents and families who are willing and able, this approach seems clearly preferable to an approach that focuses solely on oral communication." Linguist Donna Jo Napoli tells Reuters Health, “Children should be surrounded by sign language as much as possible as soon as the audiological status is determined. If the child gets a cochlear implant and does well with it, fantastic. Then the child is bi-lingual.” You'll find the abstract here and you can read the Reuters story here.