As deaf education moved closer to mainstream education in the 1980s, education departments developed "character signs" that made teaching easier. Formed by the hands in the shape of individual Chinese characters and used sequentially in sentences that adhere to Chinese syntax, character signs differ significantly from natural signs.
民國 70 年代，隨著啟聰教育向主流教育靠攏，教育單位研發出方便教學的「文字手語」，依著一般中文語句的結構順序，以手勢逐字逐字打出來，兩者差異甚大。