Parenting Toddlers

Thus far in this series on toddler development, I have covered imaginative play, fine motor skills, and gross motor skills. Today is toddler language development.

The chasm is wide for typical or normal language development in toddlers. Each stage from 12 months to 23 months has its own set of milestones. The range of typical development becomes more restrictive at 24 months, but not by much if a toddler is developing well. It’s more to raise red flags for children at risk for language delays and disorders so they can receive the help they need at the early in their development.

Five activities that help to foster language in toddlers:

Teach your toddler how to use sign language. Speech is something we take for granted, but it is actually a complex skill. Thankfully, speech is not required for effective communication. Just as someone without speech and/or hearing can use sign language to communicate, so can babies and toddlers. I will share more information in my signing with babies and toddlers series next week.

Read to your toddler. Read everything. The cereal box, the newspaper, magazines, books, road signs, etc. Encourage and help your toddler to “read” to you as well as retell the story.

Provide your toddler with a variety of oral motor activities. Give him foods that are crunchy, soft, liquid, thick, cold, warm, sweet, salty, sour, and everything in between. Order some chewy toys from a sensory play company. Encourage him to copy the movements of your mouth, including moving his tongue.

Talk to your toddler. Keep your words simply and sentences short, but talk to her as you would any other person. Engage her in conversation even if she does not answer back in a way that you can understand her. It is never too early to model proper speech and grammar. Label everything you see. Talk to your toddler about what you are doing at any given moment.

Expand on what your toddler says. Your toddler’s language will emerge in word approximations (partial words) and one-word utterances. It is through your modeling of language that he will learn more words and how to string together multiple words. So when your toddler points to the garbage truck picking up your trash and says, “Tuck!” You say, “Yes. That is a garbage truck.”

If you are concerned about your child’s language development, be specific with your toddler’s health care professional. When I was concerned about Zoey’s language development, my doctored asked how many words she had in her vocabulary. She had a large vocabulary so that was not a concern. My doctor never asked HOW she was using the words, and I was not able to clarify what concerned me. If I had said, “Zoey has a lot of words, but she does not use them to communicate with us.” my doctor would have immediately known that something had gone awry with Zoey’s language development and referred us to Early Intervention.

Drew’s speech impairment was much easier to catch at a much earlier age. She was unable to nurse, eat solid foods, she could understand but not use sign language, and her speech was extremely slow to develop. Drew began receiving help by the time she was 2 years old and graduated from therapy after two years.

Seek out a Speech-Language Pathologist experienced with children. S/he will know how to make the evaluation fun and inviting for your child and understand typical and unusual toddler behavior to include in the results of the evaluation. Check with your insurance policy to see if they will cover private therapy AND check with the Early Intervention program in your area.

For more information on typical ranges for language development in toddlers, visit the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA).

For more activity ideas, visit Zero to Three.

If you are concerned about your toddler’s language and/or social development, visit First Signs, Apraxia Kids and Speech and Language Development in Young Children.

Books that were helpful when we were concerned about Zoey and Drew’s language development:

• The Late Talker: What to Do If Your Child Isn’t Talking Yet by Marilyn C. Agin, Lisa F. Geng, and Malcolm Nicholl
• Childhood Speech, Language & Listening Problems: What Every Parent Should Know by Patricia McAleer Hamaguchi
• The Body Language of Children: How Children Talk Before They Can Speak by David Lewis

Copyright 2007 Rebecca Wilson. All Rights Reserved.
Used with permission.

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