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A+ Advice for Parents
Leave
baby talk in the crib
By Leanna Landsmann
Q: My 3-year-old twins are a delightful handful. My husband is
deployed in Iraq and I work, so my mother helps with them. She's
wonderful, but she talks "baby talk" with them. I've
heard that baby talk isn't good for kids once they're out of the
crib. She's touchy when I bring it up and says it's better to have
her talking with them than watching cartoons. I don't want to hurt
her feelings. If there are negative effects, can you provide information
to share with her? Or should I just ignore it?
A: Don't ignore it. Three-year-olds need proper language models.
Experts in children's developmental language skills discourage
the type of baby talk that's merely a string of nonsense words,
or that reinforces baby pronunciations, such as "wa-wa," "da-da," or
uses baby syntax, such as "no wanna go" and the like.
"That type of talk is never appropriate," says Marilyn
Jager Adams, author of a landmark work, "Beginning to Read:
Thinking and Learning about Print" (MIT Press, 1994). "From
birth, kids are like learning sponges, and we need to provide good
language models. Children learn proper language -- diction, grammar,
vocabulary -- only to the extent that they hear it spoken every
day. If they hear ill-formed language, they will learn and use
ill-formed language."
That said, Adams points out, there is a something called "motherese," or "parentese" that
can be quite useful with infants and toddlers. "When talking
parentese to their babies, people speak in abnormally high voices,
use exaggerated diction, repeat phrases and exaggerate our pitch
and stress on words," notes Adams. She offers an example:
A mother, wanting to teach her baby about his nose, might emphasize "nose," and
say something like, "Where is Oliver's 'nose'? Is that Oliver's
nose? Is that your nose? Yes, that's your nose! That's Oliver's
nose! Where's mommy's nose? Can you touch mommy's nose?"
Parentese is a universal phenomenon, says Adams, and research
shows it's highly functional in helping children to develop what
linguists call receptive language, the ability to hear, listen
and understand spoken words. "But the value of parentese depends
on using real, meaningful, well-enunciated words and well-formed
language structures.
"Our brains are wired to absorb words and language structures
that we hear," notes Adams. "This is obvious for little
ones, but it also happens with grown-ups. If you read a book that
favors a particular sentence structure, you might use that structure
when discussing the book. This tendency to absorb words is the
magic of children's language acquisition. Their literacy development
is strongly influenced by both the amount and the quality of speech
they hear in toddler-hood."
With twins, there is an additional concern, says Adams. "Research
shows that the language development of twins is often delayed because
they spend so much time talking and listening to each other. This
multiplies the importance of engaging them with proper language
structures."
Tell your mother how lucky your twins are to have her loving care
and ask her to use real talk full of rich vocabulary. Encourage
her to describe to the twins things she sees and does as she goes
about her day. Help her get into the habit of describing actions: "I'm
washing the lettuce we'll eat in our salad. Now I'm shaking the
bottle of dressing. We'll put the lettuce and dressing in a big
bowl, then we'll toss the salad."
Address the twins by name and engage them in conversations about
themselves. "Oliver is putting on a green T-shirt. Olivia
has on a blue T-shirt." And so on. Talk about things that
they are engaged in at the moment. If they're captivated by a display
of balloons at the supermarket checkout, count the balloons and
name their colors, rather than trying to describe how change is
made with the cashier.
Encourage your mom to read books with stories and poems to the
twins. "Reading to them is one of the best ways to foster
their language and literacy development," says Adams, "especially
when they are read to with expression and excitement."
Tell your mother she's right about one thing: having the television
on doesn't do much to accelerate a child's language development.
It's far better to talk with your children. "Kids learn language
best through interaction and in relation to things happening around
them," says Adams.
As the twins get more sophisticated, increase the sophistication
of the speech you direct to them, Adams advises. "Where children's
linguistic experience is rich, their language and literacy development
is accelerated. Where children's linguistic experience is weak
or muddled, their development is delayed. Poor language development
may result from hearing or other organic difficulties of the child.
But good language experience is almost entirely up to the people
surrounding the child."
Literacy Expert Tip
Parents should have a working knowledge of the stages of language
development from birth to adolescence so that they can best support
their children's progress and troubleshoot any problems. Adams
says the folks at answers.com have done a good job describing the
stages. Go to answers.com/topic/language-development.
Copyright 2007, United Feature Syndicate, Inc.
A-PLUS ADVICE FOR PARENTS 7-9-07
Submission inquiries? Contact Dave Gladney at
856-241-7772 or dgladney@AEPweb.org.
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