3 Mistakes That Delay Toddlers Learning To Talk

My daughter is 18 months and she will say mama, meoww, mooo and more but very rarely. I do all these things but i am tired, I don’t know what to to. She is babbling a lot but don’t want to repet anything after me…

I had two kids a year and a half apart. The eldest one would speak for the youngest and they also had a language of their own. My youngest didn't speak English until he was almost 4 years old. My two oldest grandchildren are one year and sixteen hours apart in age. They have their own language and even now( they are 12 and 11) will still speak it instead of English. They have only been in English speaking households. The oldest one had trouble learning to read but now that is her favorite pastime.

How do we teach toddlers words in a multi-language home?

It is kind of amazing how bad we are sometimes at both recognizing frustrations in others (young children) and realizing that not provoking them could be a good thing.

I’m learning more from your videos than from months of speech therapy... I’ve been feeling like it’s a waste of money but have kept up with it to feel like we’re “doing something”....

To be honest, I haven't found any channels relating to baby's development providing detailed and exactly helpful information that new parents need such as this one. But the point is I did surprise why the channels gain not many subscribers. While I feel informative and interested in this channel as I can understand english in somehow. For the others who don't speak english as a main language like me or use it regularly. They will miss a chance to know your good channel. Please add more subtitles to help more people. Anyway, appreciate for your sharing.

Stupid parents who reinforce the wrong way of saying things

With my Grandson (age 2 and half) we repeat back his comment in "correct English ". For instance, he might say "I catched it" and I'd respond "Yes, you caught it. Well done!".

Don't forget if you have older kids who are allowed to "speak for" the younger child, this delays the speech development. If the toddler grunts and 2nd kid says Dad Billy wants his sippy cup, then toddler has no motivation to speak. I've seen speech therapists have parents send the slow speaker to daycare away from tne close in age verbal child so that they have to develop speech to communicate. As a nurse ice also seen people distressed thinking their child is deaf, but actually because its a male child, with 3 female siblings 4yrs older and more playing with him more than mom and Dad, the child was content with pointing and grunting and sisters doing the guess work.

Emma I enjoy watching your videos! Thank you for taking the time to make these videos.

Wow I honestly didn't think of it that way! Thank you so much for sharing

Teaching the word is huge.

How would you handle a bi-lingual toddler asking for things in the language you don’t know?

ask your toddler:
do you want the fully organic veggie mash with organically grown carrots with no additives and very healthy?
or should I cook you some porridge like Grandma used to make?
or do you want a big soft burger with sauce?

Your toddler will answer: hungry !

No, your toddler wants to watch you speak and find out what you mean.
He doesn't want complicated questions he doesn't understand.

I just talk and describe everything. I figure babies are new here they need a tour guide lol

This is so useful! I knew not to try and prompt my daughter to say words but I do ask a lot of questions because I thought it was working for her. Such as “did you go to the park/ what did you do at the park” and she will reply “swings” and so I will say “oh you went on the swings” and she says “yeah” and I might say “and did you go on the round about/play with friends” etc but now I see I may not be giving her enough opportunity to tell me herself.

Very often they know the word but can’t pronounce it yet.

I've certainly fallen into the trap of adopting a baby's "unique words" into my vocabulary. It's sort of the same concept: we want to repeat a word to them to teach them, but when they keep repeating the same unique word to us, we sort of just learn it and start using it too.

One thing I would say is if a baby is asking for something and you don't know what they are saying, pick them up, ask them to point at what they want and sort of walk in the direction they are pointing till you figure it out, and then confirm that's what they wanted, and repeat the right word to them a few times. I do this, and it helps avoid tantrums, but I see parents who just sort of give up, go, well, I don't know what you want, and try to distract the baby with something else.

I hope no one will stress themself out over this stuff. You can do everything "perfectly" but at the end of the day your child will do things in their own time. I've been doing speech therapy with my son for 12months. He still barely talks. AND one particular question is actually the only thing he gives a verbal response to. So don't worry what anyone says, observe your child and see what works for them.

I like the method of knowing what the toddler wants, but they aren't using signs or words, so you repeat the word to them of what they want and usually, they will try it (even if they are wildly off in pronunciation). I got my friend's kid to say "up!" within about 10 seconds this way and her mom didn't know she could say any words yet! (Yes, her mom was there to witness the word being spoken.) Of course, you never want to get them to cry or tantrum, but kids are smart and they usually want to try with just a little encouragement.

I really liked the tips in this video! But I disagree with one thing: my kids used some "false" (or even made-up) words when they were toddlers, too. For example, one of my daughters used a word that sounds similar to "yummy" (we are german-speaking so the word was "lecker") when she wanted to have a treat. It was her own word for a specific category of treats from the fridge (that included pudding, yoghurt, semolina pudding and some other similar products). As parents, we adopted this word because it was a nice way to encourage her to see language as a tool of communication rather than a set of vocabulary or rules she had to learn. Of course our kids eventually learned and used the right words for all these things at some point, but to me, it was important to also show them that they can make up their own words and shape language just by participating in the conversations. We even kept some of their made-up words in our vocabulary as a family and still use them today sometimes. As they grew older, these made-up words prompted them to think and talk about how language works and how words can evolve over time. They knew from experience that language is flexible and evolving and that some made-up words would be handed down to other people or other generations if they were useful for communication while other words would not be used and disappear over time.

Gonna use this on the apprentices at work. See if they learn better

What about if the toddler knows the word but doesn't want to say it ,like my baby is 1 year 8months , understands alot ,does as instructed in such an adult way ,but refuses to say mummy..he calls everyone daddy including me ,blabbers endlessly to everyone , understands everything.. doesn't want to say anything

This is also helpful for older children with developmental delays in communication!

Did you know you said water, water then directly say wader wader?

Which of these claims are backed by research? You should include sources in the video description.

Do you have good tips for bilingual babies/ toddlers?

Thank you. I will be trying these tips.🙏

First time mum...so worried...cuz she us not even pointing to things...just crying when you take things away...I'm stressed out writing this...I'm just worried..me and my partner always speak to her directly

My daughter calls pajamas padgies and it's so cute. Thats the one word we had to remember not to say back to her in her way. Lol

Hi Emma..it's not subject related but i hope u can advise...my baby is 16 months old and sometimes he shakes his head vividly i think to show excitement...and this can last for a bit.

....any advice if any what can i do or should i do anything at all to stop it

My baby boy is 17months old he not talking that much he talk baba most of the time even he don’t say mama ..hope ur video help me .

We have a language problem we live in England but speak to more different languages. Should I pick one of them and speak only that with my daughter? I was told that it’s not a problem for kids to learn multiple languages at the same time.

I’m guilty of repeating incorrect words, octopus is oppleboots and just so cute that I myself forget it’s incorrect 😂

I've watched a lot of your videos, Emma, while I was pregnant, and the following months after delivery, and they helped me a lot to feel more capable as a parent. These communication practices you mention made a lot of sense to me and they fit well into my own style of communication with my little boy. He's 19 months old as of now and he's already forming 4-5 word sentences, using all kinds of word groups (nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc), tenses, with mostly correct Hungarian grammar. My husband and I are amazed at how fast he developed language skills. We can have full blown conversations with him now, and as a parent it's just wonderful to experience for the first time.

Keep on educating parents and caretakers, your channel is one of the best out there! Thank you!

My daughter is 2 years and she can speak correctly by learning from her elder sis who is just 3 years. Kids learn fast when they are surrounded by adults.

The parenting teacher we had recommended the holding the item till the toddler said the word thing ☠️

I used to give adults wrong answers on purpose just because I was giving them the answer I thought they wanted, or that I thought they expected from me, then I would have to sit and listen to an explanation of a thing I already knew. 🤷

So the strategy that you have mentioned, my baby is able to point or make a sign for it. But not saying them. He is 22 months old

Can you talk about when toddler is learning two languages at same time?

Thank you for your very short but perfect sharing!❤

Intuitively I always assumed saying babies unique words back and then saying it the right way as well would help them to say it right faster. My experience is with teaching violin, my students will buy into what I'm saying more if I show them THEIR sound, and then show them how the changes I'm proposing will change their sound, and then they'll see what is possible and ask for that sound from their violin in the future, and they can tell a little what it's supposed to feel like from watching me make the changes myself because of idk mirror neurons or something. I always thought copycatting babies was the same concept as long as you don't like forget about saying the right word as much as they need in order to learn it.

I can’t thank you enough!! I saw this video 2 days ago because my toddler was giving me a hard time and he didn’t want to talk or even babble! In just 2 days I see big improvements!! Less frustations less tantrums and he began babbling a lot!!!! ❤️❤️❤️

Thanks for sharing Emma

I’m not even old enough to have children. I’m not even an adult and I’m still watching these, I guess these could help in the future or when I’m talking to babies or toddlers :>

This is good recommendations, it sucks that usually in the moment you just spout out Points to apple. "This is an apple." Then a few seconds later, "What's this?" Points to apple.

My son is 3 years now he's not talking yet and he doesn't concentrate on things he only play too much and laugh but he understands all most everything we ask him but don't want to talk

Your video made me remember a valuable lesson from my first son
He spoke a little late, but definitely, school sped it up and I noticed how children make others speak by invitation and enthusiasm
Works like a charm