How to teach a child to speak

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

It is necessary to talk with an infant from the first days of life.

Why is it important not to miss the moment

Children acquire linguistic skills much earlier than many parents suspect. A month before birth, a child can already distinguish Language development starts in the womb different languages by rhythm. And the fundamental knowledge about the structure, melody and intonation of native speech is laid by Babies remember their birth language - scientists in the first months of life.

Talking to your toddler isn't just shaking the air, you're building the foundation for their future success. Children, with whom their parents spoke little, by the age of two may lag behind their peers in development by about six months Talking to babies boosts their brain power, studies show. The more words the baby hears The Power of Talking to Your Baby in the first three years of life, the higher his IQ and chances of getting good grades in school.

Conclusion: talk to your child as often as possible, even if he is not yet able to answer. Be actively involved in his language education, taking into account age characteristics. And remember: the Internet, YouTube videos, and even scientific television programs cannot replace human communication.

How to teach a child to speak from birth to 3 months

What does the child learn

• Recognize sounds and associate them with specific lip movements. Barely born, the baby already knows how to recognize the voice of the mother. The child begins to listen to the surrounding ocean of unfamiliar sounds and learns to derive meaning from it.
• Walk and gag. Various combinations of vowels "a", "y", "s" and consonants "g" and "m" - the first thing that parents hear from the baby, except for crying, screaming and grunting. Usually babies are drawn to conversations when they are full and happy with life. Agukaya, babies, among other things, develop facial muscles that will later help them reproduce more complex sounds.

How can you help

• Sing, tell nursery rhymes and sayings. Moreover, it is possible even before birth: the child begins to hear already at the 16th week of intrauterine development. This will make it easier for a new person to understand the rhythm of the language.
• Speak softly and melodiously. Adults intuitively communicate with the baby in a more subtle and melodic voice, stretching the vowels. And it is right. Various studies show that it is this style that attracts Why your baby prefers infant-directed speech to babies, helps them learn the language and develop social skills.
• Provide silence. Toddlers need time to play with their voices and not be distracted by TV sound, music and other noises.

When to worry

If, after three months, the child still does not walk, it makes sense to consult a pediatrician, neurologist and ENT.

How to teach a child to speak from 3 to 6 months

What does the child learn

• Respond to your name. By six months, most babies know what their names are. They also react to some familiar words like "mom" and "dad".
• Recognize intonation. The kid is sensitive to how they are addressed to him, - smiles in response to an affectionate voice and may cry when he hears a rude tone.
• Imitate the speech of adults. The baby adopts the tone, rhythm and tempo of the speech that he hears.
• Build more complex sound chains. This is no longer monosyllabic humming, but the overflow of vowels, which speech therapists call a flute.

How can you help

• Play "Who is this?" Bring the baby to the mirror and ask: "Who is this?" And then say the name of the child.

• Master the art of talking to children. In English, there is a concept of baby talk - a conversation focused on toddlers. In Russian, we often call this process lisping, thereby belittling its significance. Meanwhile, playing along with the baby, you help him learn the language faster. In the future, it will be easier for the child to learn more difficult words. Here are some baby talk techniques:

  1. Child mimicry: Adults do not pronounce certain sounds.
  2. Replacing pronouns with nouns. We ask: "Does Anya want to walk?" instead of "Do you want to walk?"
  3. Simplification of words and constructions to "wava", "dyudya" and "Fu, kaka!".
  4. The use of melodious intonations and diminutive suffixes.

Baby talk helps Baby talk: Mini Parenting Master Class to feel parental love for children, makes them feel comfortable and safe.

When to worry

At six months, the baby does not laugh, does not pay attention to new sounds.

How to teach a child to speak from 6 to 9 months

What does the child learn

• Recognize short phrases in context. For example, he can wave his hand in response to your: "Bye-bye!"
• Babble. The talker with manic persistence repeats the syllables "ba-ba-ba", "pa-pa-pa", "ma-ma-ma", "da-da-da", "ta-ta-ta", "ka-ka -ka "and" ha-ha-ha ". Some adults perceive babbling as a deliberate speech, and argue which word the baby uttered first - "dad" or "mom". Although he just pleases his hearing and trains his speech apparatus.
• Express emotions. In the babbling of a baby, one can discern pleasure or, conversely, grumpy notes.

How can you help

• Play sound games. Repeat the syllables that the child pronounces. Pronounce different sounds and short words yourself so that your baby can imitate you.
• Show how to speak. "Work with your face" - it is important that the little one sees how you reproduce sounds. There is also such a technique: when you say something, put a child's palm to your lips so that the child can feel their movement.

When to worry

The kid does not imitate the intonations of adults, does not react to his name, babbles rarely and monotonously.

How to teach a child to speak from 9 months to a year

What does the child learn

• Understand short phrases, point to objects that you name. At this age, babies understand much more than they can say.
• Pronounce the first meaningful words. One-year-olds, as a rule, confidently speak a few words, including the necessary for survival "mom", "dad", "give". Vocabulary can vary from two to three to 20 words, and 80% of them are nouns. Ontogeny of speech development.

How can you help

• Comment on what you are doing. If you want the baby to quickly call you mom or dad consciously, explain to him what you are doing at the moment. “Mom is drinking coffee”, “Dad is going to the store”, “Mom is working”. Ideally, if your day is eventful - the more varied the situations, the more new words the future speaker will master.
• Tell us what and what is called - body parts, objects. Speak the names of relatives and friends. Complicate phrases over time. From "Look, cat!" go to "Look, black cat!". If the child tries to repeat after you, support his efforts: name the object over and over.
• Keep practicing baby talk. Talking baby words to toddlers helps them learn to speak faster, study finds baby words like "lala" and "kisya" when dealing with babies aged nine months to one year and nine months. It is also recommended to stretch vowels - for example, when you ask: "How are you?" So the baby learns to speak faster.
• Read books with big, bright pictures. Name the items and ask your child to show them in the picture.
• Help develop articulation. Make faces, grimace, stick out your tongue - in various ways, provoke the baby to do exercises for the muscles of the face.
• Discard the nipple. Babies who still suck on a dummy after a year are more likely to have problems Can a Dummy Affect Your Child’s Speech Development? with articulation of sounds generated in the front of the mouth - like "p", "b", "t", "d" and "s".

When to worry

At the age of one to a year and three months, the child still does not say "mom" and "dad", cannot show the object in the picture.

How to teach a child to speak from one to two years

What does the child learn

• Say "No!" If the baby does not want to eat porridge, he is already able to shake his head and refuse.
• Build the first simple phrases. The child so far makes good use of simplifications: "Here uk" instead of "Here is a bow", "De ba?" instead of "Where and why did grandmother go?"
• Memorize many new words. During this period, most children experience a so-called lexical explosion. More verbs and other parts of speech appear in speech, and the vocabulary by the age of two increases to 300-400 words. But it's okay if your child starts chattering a little later - after two.

How can you help

• Use more new words and engage your baby in dialogue. Studies have shown Language Experience in the Second Year of Life and Language Outcomes in Late Childhood: the more often parents communicate with a child in the period from one and a half to two years, the better his IQ and linguistic skills in adolescence. It is especially important that the baby answers you.
• Pretend you have a sign language problem. Sometimes the kid is just too lazy to pronounce the words. Why, if you can point it with your finger. Pretend you don't understand him. Ask for words. At the very least, try to build a conversation: “Would you like some more tea? With or without sugar? Isn't it delicious?"
• Encourage attempts to speak. Even if you don't really understand what the child is trying to say, don't give up. Offer options, ask again if you understood everything correctly. And no annoyance! Only love and unlimited patience.
• Ask for help. For example, let him put a cup on the table or bring you an apple.

Richard N. Aslin Professor of Cognitive Sciences, Specialist in the Development and Comprehension of Speech in Children

Young children find it difficult to master new words. They need to coordinate more than a hundred muscles of the vocal tract. It is useful to blow soap bubbles for its development.

When to worry

At a year and a half, the baby does not listen to the conversations of others and does not say deliberate words.

A two-year-old cannot repeat after adults, even if the word is pronounced several times. He does not answer simple questions and prefers to communicate with gestures. This is a reason to visit a speech therapist for the first time.

How to teach a child to speak from 2 to 3 years old

What does the child learn

• Follow the development of the plot. The kid is already able to perceive a story that is 5-10 minutes long.
• Use abstract concepts. He already knows what it is now, what it feels like to be sad, and the more different from the less.
• Build verbose phrases. After two years, the baby learns participles and prepositions, and a little later - conjunctions and pronouns. By the age of three, the vocabulary. Stages of development of speech skills reaches 250-700 words, and the length of phrases is 5-8 words.

How can you help

• Ask questions. There are many and different - about the size, quantity, color, intentions. It is important that the baby cannot answer in monosyllables - "yes" or "no". “Look how thick the worms are! How many are there? Where do you think they are crawling?"
• Use more complex sentences. Don't limit yourself to short phrases. Speech with subordinate clauses, participles and participles, adjectives and adverbs will help the child master the structure of the language.

Erica Hoff Professor of Psychology, Author of Language Development

Children cannot learn what they cannot hear.

• Read every day. And talk about what you read.
• Learn children's songs. This will make it easier for your baby to remember new words. In addition, singing helps the development of the vocal apparatus.
• Develop fine motor skills. The parts of the brain responsible for it and for the development of speech are very close. By working with one of them, you also affect the other. Modeling from plasticine, stringing beads on a string, mosaic - everything goes to the piggy bank of eloquence.

When to worry

At three years old, the child does not name objects, does not know the names of his closest relatives, and his vocabulary does not exceed 25 words. His speech is slurred, he does not know how to build sentences, does not use verbs, does not speak of himself in the first person.