Chatter, Chatter, Chatter

We have been out and about a lot this week and coming back from BabySigning this morning you could not shut Jamie up for his chatter! Whether it was the singing got him all excited or meeting the other babies, or just the sun shining I don't know, but I thought I would look up how to help him with his talking:

Language development can vary widely from child to child, but here are some of the key stages:
By one year, you toddler will understand what you’re saying and may have a couple of words to say himself.
By 15 months he’ll have up to 10 words and will understand a simple command like ‘Get the ball’.
By 18 months he’ll know the names of the most important people in his life and will be able to follow more complex commands, ‘Pick up the ball and give it to daddy’.
By 24 months he’ll have up to 100 words in his vocabulary and will be able to form simple sentences, ‘Get ball’, ‘Mummy come’, and say ‘no’ and ‘mine’ a lot.
By three years, he’ll have about 300 words and will be able to have a conversation of a few sentences and use adjectives and prepositions (‘up, on, in, under’ etc.)

How to encourage the Chatter:
Keep talking. Your toddler may not say much yet, but he understands what you’re saying. Talking starts with listening, so the more you talk to him, the faster he’ll learn to talk himself. Talk about what you’re doing all the time, and state the obvious, for example, ‘We’re going up to have a bath now, then get you into your pyjamas and ready for a story. We could read the lovely book grandma bought you. Look, here it is on the blue bookshelf’. Name everything in your toddler's world verbally; so if you are bathing him name the duck, taps, water, bubbles, wet toes, wet fingers, wet nose… and so on.

Words and music. Read to your tot every day to get him used to books and the words on the pages. Reading to your baby at a young age helps them to hear and understand the inclinations and emotions of speech. It can also help with labelling things, so you can point to a picture and say the word, ‘Fire Engine’ to help them recognise what objects are called. If you are telling a story use different voices for each character and even different accents if you can manage. Little kids love singing and don’t care if you’re tone deaf, so play nursery rhyme tapes and sing along with them together – they’re a brilliant way of getting kids to learn and remember words. ‘Head, shoulders, knees and toes’ or the ‘Hokey Cokey’ are good for toddlers to learn which body part is which. Make sure they can see you, or other toddlers and parents pointing too, so he can see who is pointing at what.

Speak directly to your child and listen to him attentively without trying to finish off his sentences for him. Even if you don’t understand exactly what he’s saying, the chances are his body language or facial expressions will give the game away, so talk to him as if you do, ‘Have you had enough of the bricks? Do you want to play with the trains instead?’.

Listen to what your baby is saying. When you ask your baby a question, wait to see what his response is; it might be a smile or just a look towards a toy, but it is a response. Try to answer his babbles as if you were having a proper conversation, so say, ‘really, how interesting, what a lovely day you’ve had’ to him. If your baby is trying to tell you something, help him by pointing to what it might be, for instance, 'do you want milk? Your book? Your shoes?' And wait for him to respond to what you are pointing at.

http://www.gurgle.com/articles/Guide_To_Toddler/22964/Helping_your_toddler_talk.aspx