Encouraging baby’s first words

Babies are beautiful and they grow quickly! One moment they are still, quiet, dependent observers and then it seems overnight they become rampaging, loud, independent explorers!  But sometimes our children don’t develop the way we expect them to.

Baby isn’t talking!  ‘Hmm, what’s going on?’  How many words should this baby be saying?  Is it too early to say ‘spoon’?

Well, thankfully we know the answers to many of these questions.  Let’s start by taking a look at how many words children are expected to use as they grow and develop over the first few years of life (these numbers are called the milestones for expressive language).

AGE	EXPECTED NUMBER OF WORDS	EXPECTED SIZE OF PHRASE/SENTENCE
12 months	3 – 5 words	–
18 months	20 or more words	–
24 months	100 – 200 or more words	2 or more word phrases

No matter what home language we use, by 12 months our children should be using 3 to 5 words consistently.  They might say, “Dada”, “Mama”, or “bah” for ‘ball’ – try to encourage their early efforts with enthusiastic praise and by using these familiar words often.

It’s also important to count spontaneous gestures like:

• a ‘head shake’ for “No”
• a ‘hand wave’ for “Hi”
• any baby signs that you may have taught them for words like “more” and “all done”

Animal and vehicle sounds are other great spontaneous examples of expressive language in young children and a lot of fun for parents to use during play, sing-alongs, or reading times!

Try to encourage their early efforts with enthusiastic praise and by using these familiar words often.

If your child is not meeting their expressive language milestones, inform your child’s health care provider and call Early Abilities to refer your child for a speech and language assessment at (416) 338-8255 or visit our website to make an online referral.

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