Hey, there!
This is a very interesting topic to me. Thanks for bringing it up! :-)
My daughter, Ever, who is almost 18 months, said DaDa at around 4 months, at first, seemingly as babble, but within a few days, obviously referring to her daddy. By the time she was 9 months, she had a handful of words that anyone could understand. At 12 months, she had over 50 words, including "alligator" of all things! In the past 6 months, we have lost count of all her new words, which she is acquiring every day. She uses 2-4 word sentences, such as "I don't know," "Where'd you go?", "Pleased to meet you," "Want some," "Num-num's, YES!" and many others.
We have not done anything specially to get her to talk this way. We just spend lots of time with her, and talk to her just like we'd talk to anyone else. We also take her out and let her meet lots of new people all the time. She is friendly and personable, and will talk almost as readily to strangers as she does with family, given just a few minutes to warm up to the new faces and surroundings. She is fortunate enough to have a full-time mom and dad at home with her every day, and to have two awesome teenage siblings, who spend lots of time with her. We read to her on demand, and she adores books with lots of pictures that she can label.
Ever is my third early talking baby, and is typical of babies on my mom's side of the family. I really think that most of her precociousness is hereditary, but I am sure it doesn't hurt to have many people talking around and to her all the time. I also think she benefits from our genuine interest in what she has to say. I have yet to meet another baby (outside our family) who is as communicative as my children. I would love to, though! I think it would be fascinating to watch such tiny talkers interacting with one another. Anyone else out there have a little chatterbox?
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Spiral out!!!
Sylph
spiralsylph@gmail.com
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