The emotion of hearing the first words of the little ones represents a unique moment for families. Babies’ speech development starts as early as the second trimester of pregnancy, which is why it is so important for parents and relatives to talk, sing and read stories from the moment the little ones are in the mother’s tummy, as sounds aid in the development of the hearing and voice of the parents soothes the baby.
In addition, research shows that children who receive more variety of stimuli during the period of speech development and quality of interaction with the family, have it easier in the reading and reading phase.
After all, how can babies’ speech stimulus be incorporated into the routine? Discover habits and activities that diversify and enrich baby’s learning.
The Importance of Listening in Babies’ Speech Development
The first year of life can be considered the “year of listening”, since, according to studies, babies’ receptive vocabulary is about four times greater than their expressive vocabulary. That is, babies are much easier to receive stimuli than to express them in the first months of life. That is why it is so essential at this stage to invest in the diversity of incentives that can be put into practice through recreational activities in the family’s routine.
Active listening is another way to use this ability, and it should be practiced by parents, as Inside History pedagogical coordinator Claudia Onofre reminds us. Family members and guardians must learn to listen, because through this sensitive ability, children learn to express their feelings through gestures, actions and speech.
7 tips to encourage your baby to talk
As Claudia emphasizes, patience with each child’s pace of learning, respecting the stages of speech development, and understanding that each person’s evolution is unique and genuine are essential points in helping families learn how to encourage the baby to speak.
Below are 7 tips that you can apply in your family’s daily life with great dedication and pleasure.
1. Always talk
Talking to babies requires parental attention and presence since pregnancy. Dialogue with family members, in addition to stimulating hearing and speech development, creates affective bonds that radiate trust.
Children up to 2 years of age begin to express themselves by babbling. As they develop speech, they become more complex and form whole words and sentences. Always talking to babies is essential as it is a habit that contributes to the listening phase and is the time when parents can encourage the child to repeat and try out new sounds and words.
2. Learning by playing
Through play, babies learn to talk and develop social-emotional skills. At this stage, the most suitable games are to stimulate the baby to talk, games to complete the word, imitate different voices, matching games, and so on.
Regardless of the game or game chosen, the important thing is to remember that presence and quality time make learning more meaningful and enjoyable for children and their families, which helps to develop language.
3. Making faces
The little ones have fun playing faces, but in addition to having fun, the activity helps develop important motor skills for babies’ speech. The organs of the joint are a set formed by the face, lips, tongue, palate and pharynx and the activity allows everyone to move.
So making faces is a way for little ones to develop motor skills, including diction, and it also helps little ones express themselves when communicating with family, friends and caregivers.
4. Naming the objects
At all stages of a child’s development, childish curiosity it’s an open window to always learn more. Take advantage of the early years to name the items that make up Baby’s Day by repeating the name and having them repeated as: “cup”, “ball”, “bath”.
Combining creativity with meals, baths or walks can be a light and easy way for the child to discover words related to texture, colors, temperatures and tastes, which is very helpful in encouraging the baby to talk.
5. Sing and listen to songs
A simple tip that the whole family will love is to sing to and with the little ones. In addition to children’s songs, the family can present other musical genres and rhythms. The important thing here is to encourage babies to learn the words of the song, even if they babble at the beginning.
Loudness is a very important skill for learning speech, in addition to musicality for babies routine stimulates children’s motor coordination and socialization.
6. Imitate Onomatopoeia
We often find onomatopoeia in comics and books, but they also help us answer the question of how to stimulate the baby to talk. Family and caregivers can play with onomatopoeia and their sounds in babies’ daily lives or by reading.
By imitating the sounds of nature or everyday noises, such as the telephone, washing machine or cars, or the dog’s “woof-woo”, the child can interact with the environment in which he lives and at the same time increase the ability of the sound of the dog. encourage children.
7. Read and tell stories
Like songs, stories introduce new rhythms and sounds to babies. For the age group from birth to 2 years, one of the tips to make the reading moment stimulating and fun It is important for the adult to let the baby handle the books, make different gestures and sounds for the child, mimic the sounds babies make and observe the reactions, ask questions and repeat the story as many times as the child wants.
Reading creates family bonding, aids cognitive and creative development, and is a complete language development activity. Claudia tells parents about the importance of reading:
“Invest in reading in a detached way, allow yourself to step into the child’s world. Bring this moment to life by creating gestures, faces, mouths and voices of the characters. ‘Provoke’ the child to imitate what you are doing, then read aloud, remembering that through pictures children are able to read and retell the text.”
Claudia Onofre
Which of these tips for encouraging your baby to talk has worked for your little one? Tell us here in the comments.
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