Talk to Me, Baby!

How You Can Support Young Children’s Language Development

Second Edition

by Betty S. Bardige, Ed.D.

Contents

1. The Power of Play Talk
2. Baby Babbles: Birth–$1\frac{1}{2}$ Years
3. Off Like a Rocket: $1\frac{1}{2}$–$3\frac{1}{2}$ Years
4. Advances in Pretend Play and Storytelling
5. From Language to Literacy: 4-6+ Years
6. Building Language-Supporting Communities
7. References
8. Index

About the Author

Betty S. Bardige, Ed.D.

Betty S. Bardige, Ed.D., has dedicated her career to ensuring all children a promising start and a lifetime of equitable learning opportunities. As a developmental psychologist, educator, and parent, she knows that early experiences have unique power. Children who enjoy lots of rich, responsive, playful interaction with parents and caregivers develop emotional security, confidence, and increasingly rich language. As their language and knowledge grow, they ask ever more interesting questions and gain more from books, conversation, exploration, and play. Children whose language lags can fall further and further behind without extra supports. Dr. Bardige’s professional work has focused on those critical early years when children build foundations for relationships, resilience, and lifelong learning.

Baby Babbles

(Birth–1⁄2 Years)

Baby Ana, just 2 days old, is meeting her doctor for the first time. “Hey, Ana,” he coos softly as he lifts her from her hospital crib. Ana fusses as he carries her but is gradually soothed by his voice. As he lays her down to examine her, she gets her fist into her mouth and sucks steadily. The doctor makes sure that her parents notice. “Look how she’s taking over from me! She’s already figured out how to soothe herself!” Ana’s parents watch in awe as their newborn follows the doctor’s talking face with her eyes, then turns her head toward the sound of a rattle that he shakes softly near her ear. When he holds her against his shoulder, they see her cuddle, suck her hand, and then lift her head a bit to look around. “What a great baby you have!” he tells Ana’s parents as he winds up the examination.

Before giving Ana back to her parents, the doctor once again holds her with her face near his and tells her in his gentlest baby talk what a great baby she is. “You call her,” he says to her mom. “Let’s see what she does.” Ana turns toward her mother’s voice and gazes at her face.

“Let’s see what she does.” Ana turns toward her mother’s voice and gazes at her face. “She knows me already, doesn’t she?” Ana’s mother says, enraptured. “Yes she does,” the doctor responds. “And I bet she knows her dad, too.” Sure enough, Ana turns to her father, seeming to prefer his voice to the doctor’s. “She knows you both,” the doctor concludes.

Most babies do well on the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS; Brazelton & Nugent, 1995) or its simpler relative, the Newborn Behavioral Observations system (Nugent et al., 2007). These assessments were designed to provide a “portrait” of a baby’s strengths, behavioral adaptations, and vulnerabilities, helping parents see for themselves the remarkable communication and learning skills their baby already possesses.

GETTING TO KNOW YOU

Maria is nursing 4-day-old Marisol, her first child. Marisol takes a couple of sucks, then pauses. Each time she pauses, Maria jostles or strokes her lightly and murmurs encouragement. “Have some more. You’re just getting started. What a good baby you are!” The more attentive engagement they get, the more they learn to elicit.

Babies depend on adults for care and communication, as well as for food. The love affair between parent (or frequent caregiver) and child typically deepens over time. By the time they are 3 months old, most babies have learned how to hook familiar adults and engage with them in back-and-forth interaction. This process of increasingly synchronized mutual engagement, or attunement, is the basis of a positive relationship.

Attunement occurs with time between a baby and each of the important people in her life. The newborn period is a time of rapid learning. Each experience creates or strengthens synaptic connections in the baby’s brain, providing a foundation for how he will learn and who he will become.