Point, and clap, and gesture, and do the hand actions to intsy-bitsy spider. According to researchers in Chicago, when you do, you’ll be helping your child develop language skills.

Parents who gesture with meaning when they are talking to their babies and toddlers boost their child’s language development. Apparently, waving bye-bye as well as saying “goodbye” helps babies learn communication skills.

At 14 months, toddlers who had parents who made more gestures when talking were better communicators, including making meaningful gestures themselves. And amongst the same children at age 4, the ones who made more gestures as toddlers now had bigger vocabularies and better language comprehension skills.

This isn’t baby sign language, beloved craze of the yummy mummy set. It’s natural gestures that go along with everyday talking to your baby.  But proponents of baby sign language seem to have one thing right. Babies can make meaningful gestures long before they can speak words. If babies interact with their parents and caregivers using gestures before they talk, they start to learn communication earlier and this seems to give them a head start in learning verbal communication.

So hold your hands wide apart to illustrate “big”, lift your arms over your head for “up”, wiggle your fingers to make caterpillars, or do whatever gestures seem to go naturally with whatever you are talking to your baby about. Have fun, and it seems like you’ll encourage your baby’s language development.

On Tuesday, it was Family Literacy Day in Canada. I took my daughter to an Early Years Centre to participate in a Family Literacy Day program where they read and acted out a number of stories, rhymes and songs. We both had a great time. So did my 4 month old baby!

We were sent home inspired to read every day (something I have always done anyhow) to our children and to engage them in as many literacy related activities as possible.

Later that day, out came the chart paper, newspaper flyers, scissors, glue and markers. We taped the chart paper to the floor, chose a letter of the alphabet to focus on (my daughter chose the letter B) and we brainstormed different words that started with “B”. After we wrote down the words, we also hunted through the flyers for objects that started with “B”. I encouraged her to look for words that started with “B”, but she wasn’t interested in doing that.

As per usual, the activity turned into a child led activity, which was fine by me as it still focused on literacy which was the purpose of the activity in the first place, oh and of course to have fun!

Some other literacy focused activity ideas are:

Letters and words are all around us. Reading is not simply opening a book and reading the words. For children, reading involves exposure to letters and words, looking at pictures and describing what they see and drawing pictures and explaining what they drew.

Try to read with your child each and every day. Every book counts!

For many English-speaking children, the words “mama” and “dada” are two of the first words they learn to say consistently. Traditional logic dictates that the reason for this is because a baby is drawn to their parents, and (in most cases) their parents are the predominant people in their young lives. However, scientists believe they have an alternative reason.

The study involved taking brain scans of two or three day old newborns while they were hearing made up words. The scans pointed to limited or no response when the word had no repetition in it (such as “napena”), but increased activity when the word had repetition (such as “mubaba”). The scientists believe that part of the reason “mama” and “dada” are so commonly found in early language is because of the structure of the words.

And English isn’t the only language to employ repetition in parent terms. French, Italian, Swedish, and Spanish all use “papa” or “pappa” for father, for example, leading the scientists to speculate that human brains are “hard wired” for this type of early language development.

Source: Why ‘Mama’ and ‘Dada’ are baby’s first words via MSNBC.

Baby Einstein – Where Discovery Begins(TM)

Baby’s First Sounds from Baby Einstein

Perhaps the sweetest sounds you’ll ever hear are the babbles and coos
that one day become ma-ma, da-da, and I love you. Besides being music
to your ears, these baby steps of language change everything as your
little one discovers an exciting, powerful new way of relating to the
world!

Baby’s First Sounds invites both of you to share these memorable moments:
those precious “firsts” that come around once in your baby’s lifetime.

Visit the site and learn more

Read a review of the DVD on BabiesOnline