Updated December 17, 2017 17:15:51

There are hopes sign-language fluent Santas will become more commonplace following a successful meet and greet between deaf children and an Auslan-trained Father Christmas in WA's South West.

"Signing Santa" met with families of deaf and hearing impaired children in a quiet room at a Bunbury shopping centre at the weekend, with some making the two-hour trek from Perth for a face-to-face meeting with the big man in the red suit.

Katrina Payze said her daughter Mahalia, 8, had been looking forward to the visit all year.

"It makes her so happy to see Santa signing," she said.

"All year she said, 'Mum, when can we see the signing Santa'?"

WA's Deaf Society employs the Auslan trained Santas, and interpreter Adrian Chia said it was still a somewhat rare and unique service.

"In the past, we've had interpreters dress up as elves and come along to assist Santa, but now we're starting to see a demand for Santa signing directly with the children and that connection it creates with the kids is hard to put into words, it's kind of special," he said.

"The feeling that it gives them and the parents involved — we've seen tears, we've seen laughter."

"It really is a valuable emotional experience for those families."

Photo: Mahalia was very keen to see the signing Santa. (ABC News: Gian De Poloni)

Mr Chia said it was only the third time Auslan Santa has held a session in Western Australia, after his debut in Mandurah and Bunbury last year.

"In the past, if you wanted to visit Santa there was no way for your deaf child to communicate directly with him," he said.

"Awareness is starting to pick up in the community and we're seeing Auslan interpreters provided at all sorts of public events."

Mr Chia said communicating through sign language was important to deaf and hard-of-hearing children, because many could not read English.

"A lot of deaf people have trouble with English because it's actually their second language — they actually learn to sign before they learn English," he said.

"It's like someone from another country learning to speak English without ever hearing it."

Bunbury Forum said it hoped to bring back Auslan Santa next year.

Topics: hearing, events, wa, bunbury-6230

First posted December 17, 2017 16:37:18