A brief review is provided of recent research on the impact of early visual language exposure on a variety of developmental outcomes, including literacy, cognition, and social adjustment. This body of work points to the great importance of giving young deaf children early exposure to a visual language as a critical precursor to the acquisition of…

Joint writing activities between parent and child can enhance literacy skills in young children. This paper describes the strategies used by a mother to scaffold her daughter's alphabet letter shaping, word and story writing in the years before formal schooling. The strategies included identifying alphabet letters embedded in environmental print…