Did you know that babies start to learn a language even before they are born?
If you meet their look, they'll recognize your voice. Every day is an opportunity to learn. In the first few months of life, a baby learns to understand your emotional tone and respond to your smile.
By 12 months, newborns can follow simple voice directions. Let's find out more here.
What Should You Know When Your Child Understands Language?
Babies are born without language skills, yet they learn quickly.
Babies can hear by the second trimester and start responding to voices by the sixth or seventh month. After birth, your infant will notice pitch and volume changes in your voice. They're looking at how your speech indicates happiness, grief, love, fear, anxiety, and anger, even when you don't know what the words represent.
They listen to what you say. These skills help them to understand what you're saying.
When Infants Understand Words And Instructions
Birth to the first month
- Observe your sense & voice
- Develop a strong bond
- Develop a sense of security from your response to their cries and hunger cues
2-3 months
- Calm down on hearing mother voice
- Communicating through smile
- start making cooing sound to communicate
4–7 months
- Learn to respond to their name
- Pick up on the emotional tone in your voice more
- Start mumbling and "conversing" by screaming, kicking legs, chatting, or laughing.
8–12 months
- understand basic, short-term instructions
- Ask, say no, insist, or greet using noises or gestures
- learning pecific actions like "goodbye" when someone leaves the room
13-18 months
- Show verbal progress - Say 'mama' or 'dada'
- begin to recognize toys
- point to person when they are interested
By the age of 2.5 years
- Children can normally follow simple commands, even those with two steps.
Above Age 3
- vocabulary will grow to carry on conversations spanning many sentences.
- The normal "who," "what," "where," and "why" questions will also be made.
How To Teach Your Child To Communicate?
Babies develop in safe, loving environments. They're more calm and more responsive to your lessons after being with you. Below are more ways to improve language and conversational skills:
- Beginning at birth, describe to your infant where you are going and what you are doing throughout the day.
- Face-to-face interaction is key to language learning.
- Point out things and have a conversation about them as they get older.
- The more words babies hear from birth, the better their vocabulary and language skills will be in the future.
- Start reading to your baby as soon as they're born to help their speech. Your baby may not understand the words or the story, but they will learn the meter, rhyme, and rhythm of language. As a result, the mind is more prepared to learn grammar and vocabulary.
- The more you play with your kid, the more they'll understand how the world works. Give them toys and games that are right for their age. This will help them learn and grow.
- Identify and applaud good actions more than bad ones.
- You should try to praise your child's good behavior four times as often as you correct the bad.
Key Points To Be Remember
- Newborns are tested for hearing loss in the early days of life, but this is not always a reliable indicator. So look for warning signs that your baby may have a hearing problem. For example, if they don't react to loud noises or recognize your voice after three months, ask their doctor about a hearing test.
- Each baby is different and will hit each milestone at its own pace. Your baby's rate of development may be slightly faster or slower than expected.
- Comply with basic directives by the time they're 18 months old.
- By nine months, they should be able to answer in their name.
- Babies may detect and react to environmental sounds as early as six months.
When Your Child First Starts Talking, What Should You Do?
If you do the following, you will be able to aid in your child's verbal development:
- Praise
- Imitate
- Observe
- Don't give up!
- Allow your kid to take charge.
- Play
- Listen
- Elaborate
- Narrate
- Read out loud
To develop more vocabulary development.
However, not meeting specific requirements could be indicative of a deeper problem. If you are concerned about your child's language skills, you are the best person to ask for advice. Talk to a doctor if you're worried your child may have a hearing or developmental delay.