even though you have a dirl andi have a boy i think kids live life at their own pace ... nix can only say about 7 words at 20 months ...
but docs say hes fine , so i would nt worry .. he can say these words :
DS is almost 12mths and can say mumma, dad-dad, nan-nan, uh-oh, mm-mmm, and makes noises that are his version of a cat and dog. There's a dog down the road that just does not stop barking, so he hears that and makes a woof noise. We have 2 cats and when he sees them or when he wants to get their attention he makes a meow noise. Cute too, coz it almost sounds like that! I know what he's trying to say when he says it. Just today he must have seen a cat somewhere when we were out and he made the noise. Both dh and I have heard him repeat the word "ten", and once he made a "word" that sounded like the f-word...
He says a lot of his own nonsense words. He says them individually or in a magical made up sentence. Must copy me coz I noticed one of his "sentences" ended with a laugh... uh-oh!
OMG some of these littlies really have lots of words! Oskar is 16 months and nowhere near that many! He says cow, mum, dad, go car, ta (used very sparingly..lol)... that's all that comes straight to mind. He KNOWS what things are if you ask him to find pictures in books and he says quite a few animal sounds, but wow @ some of these bubs. If he SHOULD be saying around 50 words by the time he's 18 months, I seriously don't see that happening. He's a great uh uh and pointer to objects...but hmmm.
From a mum who had a slow to start talker who is now in speech therapy, please don't keep waiting if you think there is a problem with speech. Talk to your child all the time - read books, hold conversations with them, ask them questions about things - anything that will make them talk back to you. Dont use their baby talk words if they cannot say what something is - use the proper name for it so they learn how to say it themselves. Public waiting lists are long and if you do think that there are issues (any of you) then get a referral and have them assessed and get their name on the waiting list.
For what it's worth, I think that she isn't going too bad, but like with anything there will be those that have more and those that have less words, so you can't really compare children. All you can do it talk talk talk with her and encourage her to talk too - practice animal sounds and names etc, shapes or colours. Anything that will engage her.
my dd started talking around 13-14 months and now says over a hundred words... from around 10 months she could easily understand what we were saying, and from around 14 months we had to spell words that we didnt want her to hear, she understood EVERYTHING...
i think give it a couple more months, but talk to her all the time and teach her the name of objects, anything and everything, clock, fridge, tap, dishwasher etc... then ask her where things are and she will point or look in the right direction, this is all part of building their language and vocab.
to be honest i know its individual, but with all the talking and teaching ive done with my dd i would be alarmed if she wasn't saying much by now at 16 months. i am baffled by the older kids from playgroup not talking yet - but i guess it depends on the individual and how much they have been talked to etc...
personally i think alot of people leave teaching language etc too late, or don't teach it at all... we started at around 7 months or so and it has made life so much easier with her now being able to communicate.
and SING SING SING!!!!
dd sings the last word to the lines of a heap of nursery rhymes if i sing along with her... she also knows the start of the alphabet (A, B, C) and 1, 2, 3.... and can point out and say her colours - BASICALLY TEACH THEM EVERYTHING!!! they are like sponges ready to soak things up, gotta make the most of it.
DD is 18 months now and I would say that she is in the 35'ish words catagory (although not really clear spoken, kwim) and about 15 sound assosiations. But what amazes me more is her grasp of words that she can not yet speak. Example. I ask her to pick up the paper and throw it in the bin, she does that without looking glazy-eyed .. and she can't say paper or bin yet AND I don't have to point it out for her. Now THAT is gets me everytime. This little person is just an amazing discovery!!
Currently she is trying to repeat EVERYTHING you say. I can't wait for her to have a "Mommy what is this, mommy why is that, mommy how come this" conversations with her!! I LOVE kids minds!!
my 19 month old can maybe say 15 words, and generally i have to prompt him.
he still has his own little language for things, the tirck i found is not to talk for them. Keep prompting them to tell you what they want, what things are etc. Its amazing to see exactly how much we talk FOR our kids.
I wouldnt worry, i used to worry about his development but i realised its my expectations i am placing on him - and sometimes that is a really bad thing.
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