Struggling to teach baby to talk to you or your husband. And calling you mammy or daddy!
Every parent wants to hear these words from their kiddo and some might even bet on the first word of the baby.
No doubt your love for your tot is perpetual. But I would say, to allow your baby to say mammy and daddy, you need to work a little harder. And for that, you should know how to teach a baby to talk.
I know you are already working on it but you need to work a bit more. And I would like to assist you in the same.
Let me start with, your baby won’t start telling the story, how mamma feeds him or how dad is bringing lots of toys for him. Above all, he won’t tell you how he is loving all the attention and love.
To listen to all the great things from your baby, you simply have to follow the guide to talking to babies, which I will discuss with you. It is not like you need to learn how to fly an airplane so don’t worry. However, no doubt, you have to make efforts.
How to Teach Baby to Talk from 0-3 Year Old Baby?
Here, starts your guide to talking babies. Mostly, babies start saying a few words like mamma or daddy by the age of 12 months. With that, the baby also starts to understand things like what you are saying.
Further, by the age of 18 months, your baby would be able to use several easy words as well as he will learn to point at things, people, objects and even you can teach the name of body parts and other things.
Let’s discuss what you have to do to teach baby to talk age by age, to give you a better understanding of things.
Birth to 3 Months
At this stage, your baby listens to the noise around him and the best part is that he tries to make the same noise by cooing and gurgling. Here what you can do is to teach a new nice noise to your baby,
- You can sing to your baby. The best part is that you can do this even before the baby’s birth, yes he can hear you
- Make a quiet time, that simply give your baby some time to babble and play in a peaceful environment without TV. Your baby does not need to listen to the voice of your favorite TV character. It further includes radio and other noise
- The baby also watch you turning while listening to the voice, this helps him teach respond to voice or noise
- Talk to the baby and people around. Yes, I know your baby can not understand your words or what you are saying but this will enable your baby to learn your voice. With that, baby love to see and hear people talking
3 Months to 6 Months
So far, you must have understood that by watching how you talk to people or the baby. Your baby also learns babbling in varied sounds. You can also help the baby to be a great talker by,
- To enable your tot to look into your eyes, hold the baby close to you
- Then with a smile talk to your baby
- If your baby babbles, all you have to do is to imitate the sound
- And if your baby is imitating you, you can do it again
6 Months to 9 Months
The good is news is that at this stage, your baby would play with sounds like a clown play with balls.
If I have to mention some sounds then your baby would say words like “dada” and “baba” by the 6-7 months. However, babbling does not have any real meaning.
Also, your baby would understand how you are talking to him. For instance, your baby would cry if you sound unhappy or angry and would laugh if you sound jovial. If your baby is not saying any word, so far you can help your bundle of joy to understand words by,
- Give a toy to your baby. You can say something to your baby about it such as “ See how cute Bunny is”
- Ask a question to the baby, like “ where is your kitty?” if your tot is indicating, great! If not you can show him where it is
- You can help your baby move his hands while rhyming. For this, you can simply play peek-a-boo or pat-a-cat
- You can also use a mirror to help your baby to say words like his name. Simply, allow your baby to see the mirror and ask, who is he? If your baby does not respond, tell him his name
9 Months to 12 Months
By now, your baby would learn to say uncomplicated words. To add, he also looks at you when you say where is mammy or dadda?
He will stop when you say, no. On the top, your baby can now indicate what he wants? Specifically, your baby can point at things, and make sounds. Additionally, your baby would also use a range of consonants sounds and tones.
12 Month to 15 Months
Now your baby begins to start saying words. Specifically to indicate to a particular object, such as for bottle baby might use the word “baba” and for juice, he might use “juju”.
By the end of 12 months, your baby most likely to say mamma and dadda.
Baby does not always use words when he needs something. Sometimes he can also point out at things, reach things he wants, looking at the object, and even babbles.
All you need is to focus and try.
You can also help your kid to learn words, here is the guide to talking to babies,
- First, smile or claps as an appreciation when your baby names the things. To encourage the baby to learn new words you can also say something such as, “look at the bunny, it is so soft and fluffy”
- You can also talk to your baby by using easy words like cups, juice, etc. Allow your kid to give a name to these
- Talk to your baby about the things he wants to talk, or things of his interest. Enable your tot to tell you about it
- You can use picture books to allow your baby to name the things in the book. Don’t hurry, give your baby time to name the things
- You can also pretend to play with your babies such as a doll or toy animal. You can include the name in your play, like Hey! Iron man wants to play too. He is so strong. Can he roll the ball with you?
- Ask your baby about the things you perform regularly. You can ask your baby to choose a shirt to wear or ask what does he want, milk or juice?
- You can also build the sentences further like if your baby says ball. Then you can say, yes, it is your big pink ball
15 Months to 2 Years
To build a vocabulary your baby is entirely dependent on you. He is going to use your complex gesture to communicate with you.
Yes, that’s the fact, you play a major role in baby development. For instance, if your baby walks with you to the bookshelf, chances that he might say “buk” which might indicate that he wants to read the book.
What you can do is,
- You can teach the name of the body parts to the baby. Ask him, “where is his nose”, then point at your nose. That is how your baby would end up pointing at his nose. Likewise, you can do the same with toes, fingers, tummy, ears, etc
- If your baby is indicating something or giving you something, you can talk about it to your tot
- Share nursery rhyme and stories
- You can also hide the toy which your baby wants. Later, allow your baby to find it and let him share his joy
- Repeat baby’s attempt at words, simply make it a two-way conversation
2 Years to 3 Years
At this stage, your baby’s language skills will grow with leaps and bounds. He will create trouble-free sentences like “mamma go bye-bye”. Not only this, but he will also be able to answer easy questions “where is your bunny?”
And by 36 months your baby will able to answer the complicated questions too such as “what do you do when you are hungry?”
You can also do,
- Play more pretentious plays
- Act on imaginary scenes like fixing the broken car, playing with dolls and animals, etc.
Later, you can also teach your baby to talk by,
- Teaching the baby how to pronounce his name and surname
- Ask open-ended questions to the baby, if your baby loves orange juice, you can ask, “what is sweet and you drink in the morning?” These type of question helps in developing the ideas and allow baby to express him
- Play more and more pretentious play with the baby. For this you can play, acting out on stories and role-playing
- Perform articulation exercise with your baby as this will be fun for the baby
- Sing and praise your baby
- Give your baby the opportunity to use and learn words and language
- You can also ask the question to your babies such as number, size, and shape
- Ask your baby to tell you his favorite story and story from his favorite book. You can ask questions like who is cinderella?
- Talk to your baby regularly
- Take your kid to the library with you
- Describe your baby, what you are doing
- Your kid speaks more words does not mean, you would avoid the quiet time. You still need to give some quiet time to your kid. You can simply switch TV, and radio and allow your baby to talk, sing and play with you
At last, you have to follow the above-mentioned things like singing with baby, reading for baby, talking to baby, babbling with baby, Playing with baby, etc. As these are the things that will help your baby to develop a language.
If you are looking for home remedies for late-talking children, these are the only things that you can do to help your baby.
What Age Should a Child Start Talking Clearly?
When do babies start talking clearly? What age should a child start talking clearly?
These are the common questions that haunt the parents during the baby’s development, isn’t it?
Typically, your baby should start talking clearly is by the age of 4 years. However, as your tot is still learning, you might notice that he would mispronounce some words but that’s fine, he will learn. So, you don’t have to worry about it.
So, by the age of 5 years, your baby can talk fluently and can recite a story in his own words as well as can use more than five words in a sentence. Now no need to worry about how to teach baby to talk.
When a Baby Boy/Girl Should Start Talking?
After knowing, when do babies start talking fluently, let’s move to the language development of different genders, that is baby boy or baby girl.
Let’s start with when a baby boy should start talking?
Though like every other child, your baby boy would start babbling at the age of 3-6 months, then he will start saying some unclear words like “dada” by the age of 7-9 months and more.
At last, by 4 years your baby boy would start talking.
To be a surprise, baby girl would start talking promptly than a boy.
Though the difference is not much, it is just a few months. To be precise, generally, your child would start talking around 18-24 months of age. The baby girl would start talking in the beginning and baby boys will talk at the end. So, here is, when a baby girl should start talking.
Here, you got to know, when a baby boy/girl should start talking?
Hence, if your baby boy is speaking a bit than girl, you don’t have to worry.
What are the Signs of Language Problems?
Some parents ignore the fact that late talking could be a serious issue. However, some take it really seriously.
Whatever the case with you, I’m going to mention some of the signs you should notice during the language development phase of the baby.
- If your baby is facing issues in understanding things, he is facing some issues in language development. Try out pointing at a thing, if your baby is understanding depending on her age, in that case, you don’t have to worry
- Did you hear your baby reciting new words? If that’s the case with your baby, you need to look after it
- Using gestures is one of the parts of a baby’s language development, like saying “hi” or “bye” by waving hands
Conclusion
So far, I would say, you need to pay attention to teach your baby how to speak.
Fingers crossed, however, you notice that your baby is not babbling, cooing, and not responding to you till the 18th month. Then I would advise you to visit the doctor. As this could be a sign of developmental delay.
Although, you do not have to panic as some baby’s take time to learn things.
Did you get all the information regarding how to teach baby to talk? If I missed out something, please let me know in the comments below.
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Happy Parenthood!
