Your Instructor Independent Certified Baby Sign Instructor Thank you for taking the time to read my profile. I'm Lisa Fairney Mother of 6 and Nana to 4 . I love children very much and have worked with Special Needs children for over 20 years. If you read on you will learn how I became interested and then certified to teach "Baby Signs ". I hope to meet you and your little one in the future. I can be reached at email : lisa.fairney@babysignsprogram.com or phone : 604-316-9760 Future Classes will be posted under Calendar Thank you My first experience with Sign was when I was 18 years old . I attended Beginners' Sign at the Fraser Valley College. I wanted to communicate with a young man that worked as a laborer with my boyfriend's family business. I was intrigued with the gestures he was using and saddened by our inablility to understand what he was trying to say. Or to make him understand us. I have always been interested in the deaf community . I was raised knowing the Helen Keller story and always wanted to be an Annie Sullivan ( Helen's teacher ) from a very young age. What could be more rewarding than teaching a child to communicate that otherwise would fall to the ground in a heap of frustration. So at 19 years of age, armed with only Beginners' Sign, I was hired by the Chilliwack School Board to help with the intergration of the first deaf student to enter a hearing school . I spent recesses and lunch times teaching sign to fellow students who wanted to communicate with the young grade 4 boy . I'll never forget the first time I walked into the class after announcing that I would teach who ever wanted to learn. I walked in and to my amazement the class was bursting at the seams . So many kids interested in this wonderful language . I worked for 20 years as a Teacher's Assistant both here and in Alberta . I most recently went back to school and took " Sign Exact English level 1 " so I could talk to and understand a kindergarten student in the class that I was working in. I began exploring how I could use my signing and my love for young children and babies together. This led me to "Baby Signs"....I'm so excited about the prospect of teaching Moms and Dads to sign with there babies. It's not only extremely helpful and rewarding but a lot of fun ! Who knew that these little guys were able to tell you what they want as young as 6 months old. That is how old one of my students was when her parents ran to her room in the middle of the night because she was screaming....when they got to her crib side, little 6 month old Mya signed " milk " .... I got a call in the morning from a very excited Mom ! It's phone calls like this that make me love what I'm doing ! I hope this gives you a little insight as to who I am. Thank you again for taking the time to read my profile. I hope to meet you and your little one in the near future. Lisa   [ Back ]