Talking - helping your toddler to talk

Your childs ability to speak is directly link to their ability to listern. By listening to others, your child learns what words sound like and how to put a sentence together. As a baby, he discovered first how to make sounds, then how to make those sounds into real words, hearing the word mummy or daddy for the first time is an amazing feeling it makes such differance from the noise and the conversations in their own language that only they understand. Once they master the first few words there then follows a period of extraordinary growth, as you watch your toddler go from speaking a few simple words to asking questions, giving directions, to saying no and why and then to regaling you with stories they have made up, watch out for that it is not so much lieing as it is experementing but they can be very convincing, I recall a story of a child drawing a visit to a hospital to see an uncle that had been in a car crash only to find that it was completely made up the child loved the fact that he had been belived and try may different stories for the fun of it.

Milestones

12 to 18 months
By the time your child is one it should have a grasp of a handful of words, by the time they are 14 months they may have up to 20 "words" (these may be more like sounds) that only they and someone close to them can understand. They even practice inflection, raising their tone when asking a question. they quickly realise the power that talking gives them to get what they want or need. The words may still come with hand action to fully comunicate thier meanings but the hand gesturs will lessen as the speach develops. It is difficult for them at this time as they struggle to be understood so don't be suprised if you see grumpyness and frustration this is a good sign as it shows how hard they are trying to comunicate and that they care whether or not they are understood

By 16 months, your toddler will probably start making many common consonant sounds, such as t, d, n, w, and h. Once they learn these sounds it leads to a rapid vocabulary spurt that most children go through starting around 18 months. Don't expect to hear all these sounds in actual words yet. But you may hear him repeating them when they are alone or to thier toys it not madness though it may siound like it, it is practice.

19 to 24 months
By this age you child will understand up to 200 words and use up to 75 of them on a regular basis. Most of these words will be nouns, car, dog but between 18 and 20 months, the pace will pick up as they can learn ten or more words each day. This is the time to be very weary of what you are saying as children have a habit of repeating choice phrases at the most in appropriate momments and sometime in the correct inferance. Starting around the third birthday your child will start to form sentances and be able to sing simple tunes.

25 to 30 months
Now that your child has a bigger vogablary you will now find them exerimenting with volume. They may for a whils shout or whisper at the most inappripriate moments but they will develop an instinct for the right volume with gentle encouragement from you. Between ages of 2 to 3 their working vocabulary will grow to up to 300 words and they will understand up to 900 words. They will start to string nouns and verbs together to form complete but simple sentences.

31 to 36 months
By the time your child reaches three thier speach is much more sophisticated they will be able to carry out conversations with any one they will even change their speach to suit the people that they interact with. You may find that they speak to you in one manner but their speak changes aroung other children.

You can help your child's language skills develop in many different ways firstly,

• Talk, It has been shown that children whose parents speak to them extensively when they were babies have significantly higher IQs and richer vocabularies than other children. Its good to describe what you're doing, point things out, ask questions, sing songs, it is ok to use some baby talk but bear in mind that your child is learning from you they learn to speak through listerning so if its all baby talk their speak development will take longer

• Read, Try to read to them regularly this is a great way to expose him to new vocabulary, it helps them to understand the way in which a sentance is put together, and how stories flow. It helps if you not only read to the child but you ask your them to show you things to find things on the page.

• Listen, try to face your child when they talk to you they are more likely to be responsive if they feel that you are intrested in what they are saying.

As with walking all children develop at diferent rate but it is best to have them checked by a medical proffesional if you feel that they are far behind the normal developmental stages, trust your instinct you know your child better than anyone, below are some possible warning signs that it is worth looking out for.

At 12 to 18 months

at 12 months, your child dosen't use any gestures like waving or shaking thier head, they are not at least trying to make sounds, or they are not communicating to you when they need help to do something
at 15 months, they fail to respond to words like no or to someone saying bye to them, if they can't say a few words, or they don't say mummy or daddy or dirivitivets of those words
at 16 months, they can not point to the parts of the body when asked to
at 18 months, they are not saying at least 6 words
by 19 to 20 months, they are not pointing out things of intrest such as cars or dogs
by 20 months, they aren't making at least six consonant sounds
at 21 months, they do not respond to simple directions
by 24 months, they don't imitate actions or words of others, or they, can't point to named pictures in a book or are unable to join two words together, or know what house hold items do
at 30 months, they can't name at least three body parts or be understood by anyone in the family
by 32 months, has difficulty singing fragments of nursery rhymes
at 36 months, doesn't ask questions or can't be understood by strangers at least some of the time, or unable to name most common household objects, can't speak in short phrases, are unable to understand short instructions.
at 3, they have no intrest in other children, they have extrene problems separating from a parent
at 4, isn't able to be fully understood by any one