Learning to talk

One of the most exciting milestones for parents and children is the child’s first word. For most kids, this happens around one year of age. Parents can encourage language learning, starting before birth!

Babies can hear before they are born. Scientists say that babies can hear music, sounds, voices and especially mom’s voice while they are in the womb. Newborns will recognize music and voices they heard before birth, so it’s never too early to talk to your child!

Newborns communicate with parents without language. Your baby will communicate by crying, looking, listening, smiling and facial expressions. Babies learn very quickly how to communicate with parents with cries and when parents respond to their babies cries baby learns that he can communicate with others.

Babies love to listen to voices so talk and read to your baby often. Look directly at your child’s face and just talk or sing! Hold your baby and read to him. As your baby grows she will begin to coo, make gurgles and babble. Imitate her sounds, look baby in the eyes and say her noises and coos back to her. When you babble with your baby you are teaching her turn taking and conversation, even when you don’t use any words.

As your child grows the early sounds become babbling-usually a string of sounds such as dadada or bababa.  This is an important way that babies practice making sounds. You may even notice your child practicing babbling when he is alone in the crib after waking up from a nap. Your child loves it when you repeat his sounds back to him, and also when you describe his world. Talk to your child, sing to your child, and read to your child and you will be providing him with lots of sounds and words, an important part of learning language. Play games like peek-a-boo and pat-a-cake to help your child get connections between actions and words.

Before your child ever says her first word, she understands lots of words. This is called receptive language. Usually, by six months of age your child will understand her name, and by 9 to 12 months your child will begin to understand many words. He will probably understand words such as no, names of special people in his life and names of objects that are important to him.

At about this age your child will be able to communicate with you quite well without words, maybe by pointing or gestures. Your child will get his message across by using non-verbal means such as waving bye-bye, shaking her head  “no”,  pointing when he wants his cup or toy or holding up both arms to be picked up. Name these actions for your baby when he does them to help him make word connections. Describe what is happening in baby’s world, maybe describe what you are doing when you get her food ready or name body parts when you give baby a bath. Describing baby’s world gives him exposure to lots of different words and sounds. Reading is another good way to expose your child to words and sounds. As you read a book, point to a picture and name it, then ask your child to point to the picture in the book.

All of the language, talking and reading to your child will pay off when your child says that first word, usually around a year old. The words will keep coming quickly after that. By age two your child should be saying short sentences and can follow simple instructions. By age three years children can follow instructions with two or three steps and can understand most words. Sentences are more complete and longer and most speech is understandable to strangers. By age 4 kids understand grammar and can use plurals, pronouns and even sing a song or rhyme from memory.

From the beginnings of making sounds to your newborn to repeating babies sounds back to her, reading, talking and singing parents play an important and exciting role in helping their child learn to talk and communicate.

Quality Time

The time you spend with your child is precious. As any parent of a grown child will tell you, time flies by much too quickly. Looking back most parents think “I wish I had spent more time with my child.” So take the time to spend time with your child as much as possible.

Parents have many other responsibilities that can get in the way of spending time with children. The term quality time was created with this dilemma in mind. The term was created when experts found that parents were too busy working, taking care of the house, running errands, and focusing on other responsibilities to spend much time with their children. Many parents felt that scheduling time with their children would help them to spend meaningful time with their child. But quality time does not have to be scheduled. Quality time can be anytime you are with your child. There are many times throughout the day when we may be shopping, waiting in line, driving to school, or getting ready for bed when we have a few moments of downtime. Use this time as quality time with your child.  Parents can turn this time into fun and sneak in a little intellectual stimulation, too.

So, how can you turn waiting time into quality time? The best place to start is by paying attention to your child and talk to him. Ask a question and really listen to his answer. Ask your child’s opinion and take it seriously.

You can ask a serious question or a silly one. Some examples might be asking your child to describe something he sees while you are driving in the car, and you can guess what he sees. You can ask a younger child to find something red or blue, or count a certain color car as you drive by. Start a discussion by asking about things your child is interested in, you might ask a child who likes dinosaurs which dinosaur he would want to be and then find out why he chose that dinosaur. Have your child imagine she was a superhero, then ask her to describe her powers.  Tell your child what your favorite dinosaur is or what superpower you would want too.  This can spark a lively discussion and you will both learn a lot about each other.

How about adding quality time to dinner preparation? Instead of parking your child in front of the TV or a video game, involve him in your dinner preparations.  Children can help with meal preparations, setting the table and clean up. If you do these things together you are having some quality time together. Depending on their age, kids can wash or chop vegetables, read a recipe, measure ingredients, stir and mix, and lots of other jobs in the kitchen. Kids will be learning while they are doing, and keep up the conversation! Cooking time is a great time to talk about foods you like and foods your child likes.

Waiting time in a doctors office is easy to turn into quality time with a few markers or crayons and some paper. Carry a notebook and you can draw together while you have a few minutes to wait. You don’t have to be an accomplished artist, just have fun doing it. You can draw a picture together, draw a story, or even draw a picture and write a story about your picture. Of course, the old standby of the tic tac toe games or hangman is great fun for kids too.

Bathtime can easily turn into quality time. Science experiments are fun and easy to clean up in the tub. Make a volcano with baking soda and vinegar, experiment with different objects that sink or float, try to sink a boat by pouring water into it. There are lots of fun things to do in the tub with your child.

Quality time at bedtime is easy too; read a book together! Talk about your day, and maybe about what you will do tomorrow.

Of course, the common denominator of all quality time activities is paying attention to your child. Talk to your child, listen to his answers, ask her opinions, and you will be well on the way to a better relationship with your child. Use all of the small moments of your day to spend time with your children. Remember, they grow up fast!

If you want some ideas about things to do for quality time that are free or inexpensive, the book “Quality Time Anytime” by Penny Warner has lots of great ideas. It’s available in the Lending Library at Cooperative Extension. Come check it out for free along with our other parenting resources