Sonidos de Animales

In an earlier post, I wrote about how Sofía signed and spoke the word she signed at the same time, for the first time. She doesn’t do this often; she usually just chooses one form to communicate her word. The only other time she will sign and SPEAK simultaneously is when we ask her about sounds that animals make. What she does is funny. When we ask her what sound said animal makes, she will orally make the sound and sometimes sign the animal simultaneously, but this isn’t what she does ALL the time. Usually she will only make the oral sound of the animal even if she knows the sign. There are a few exceptions however. If she doesn’t know the sound for the animal, she will only sign the animal, as she does with elefante. (Really, who can make an elefante sound?) With leon, she ALWAYS makes the sound and signs leon. She knows the sign and sounds for caballo y pájaro (horse and bird), but she usually only makes their sounds and will not sign them. Go figure. Then SOMETIMES, not all the time, sometimes when I point to a picture of a caballo o pájaro and ask her what it is, she will sign the animal name and other times she will make their sound! There is no rhyme or reason---she is a TODDLER!!!  I've been trying FOREVER to videotape her doing these things, but she has not been very cooperative or I have not been very sucessful at it.  I'll try to post it when I figure it out.