Language stimulation in children Talking and communication is natural to human beings. As parents and caregivers, talking is the first way to connect with our children. We see infants cooing and gurgling around 4 months, babbling with the same sound around 7 months (e.g. bababa, dadada), babbling with varied sounds around 9 months (e.g. bagagada), first words emerging around 12 months, and simple word combinations around 24 months (e.g. Daddy go, no ball, more milk Mummy). Often parents are concerned that their child is not meeting these language milestones, and that they are ‘behind’ other children their age. It is important that these language milestones be taken as rough guidelines as children develop at different rates, and there is a wide scope of ‘normal’ when it comes to language development. This is where early language stimulation can help. These are simple techniques which can be included in your daily life to aid the child’s language and communication skills. 1. Imitation Imitation is one of the earliest language stimulation techniques that you can start using with your infant. Your baby will develop simple actions before he develops sounds, so make sure you copy these actions at every opportunity. As soon as your baby starts making noises (gurgling, squealing, cooing) you can start imitating them. By simply copying your baby’s sounds, you are teaching the basics of conversation skills- taking turns. Your baby is learning that he says something, and then you say something. You are also reinforcing your baby’s vocalisations. In other words, your baby will come to expect you to copy him when he makes a sound, and when you do copy him he will be happy about it. This simple reinforcement will encourage him to vocalise more and more. Soon your child will be imitating you, which is how he will begin to learn words. 2. Running commentary Children learn language (words and sentences) through listening to others. The more language they are hearing, the more readily they are able to pick up new words and phrases. Often children have to hear a word many times before they will attempt to say it, which suggests that Mums and Dads need to do a lot of talking to encourage their children to learn new words. A simple way to do this is by providing a ‘running commentary’ throughout the day. In other words, describe all the things that your child is doing as they are doing them. Use simple language and repeat the main words. For example, while, you are bathing your child, you could say, “Oh! Baby is having a bath! Splash splash!! Looks who’s in the tub? It’s a duck! The duck says quack quack!” By commenting on your child’s immediate interests and actions, you are providing them with words and sounds that are motivating in that moment, and it is these words and sounds that they will be more likely to say. 3. Labelling When your child begins to use single words, you will most likely hear a lot of labels (nouns) such as kitty, puppy, milk, ball. Right now, these are the most useful words for your child as these are the things that he can see and touch. At this stage it is important for you to encourage your child’s vocabulary by labelling other things in your environment. Your child does not know all of the words yet, and may be simply pointing to different things and looking at you questioningly. When this happens, give your child the word. 4. Build on your child’s words Once your child is using lots of single words (50+ words, around 18-24 months of age) it is time for you to start speaking in 2-3 word sentences. The technique of ‘building on your child’s words’ simply means taking your child’s single word and adding a bit more information. For example, if your child points to a cat and says ‘kitty’, you could respond with ‘Oh! White kitty. Kitty is sleeping.’ In this instance you have given your child a few more words that they can use to talk about the cat: a colour (white) and an action (sleeping). These words will be interesting to your child in this moment, because he has shown interest in the cat. You have also shown your child how to combine these words to make a short sentence. Once your child is a bit older and using 3+ word sentences, it is time for you to start demonstrating appropriate grammar and sentence structure. At this stage your child’s sentences contain mostly content and not a lot of grammar or joining words. Finally, it is important to spend time with your children and enjoy the process. It is important to inculcate language stimulation in your daily routine.