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Talking Toddlers
I’ve Helped Toddlers Talk for 35 Years. If You Want Your Baby to Talk Well, Watch This. Ep 132
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And at that moment, mom finally saw how capable he was and how willing and interested he was. That he wasn't just roaming around the toys all the time, not knowing what to do. That he really could be intrigued into trying something. And the truth is.
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Hello, and welcome to Talking Toddlers, where I share more than just tips and tricks on how to reduce tantrums or build your toddler's vocab vocabulary. We're going to cover all of that, but here our goal is to develop clarity, because in this modern world, it's truly overwhelming. This podcast is about empowering moms to know the difference between fact and fiction, to never give up, to tap into everyday activities so your child stays on track. He's not falling behind. He's thriving. Through your guidance, we know that true learning starts at home. So let's get started.
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If you're a mom of a 12 to 24 month old, you've probably heard this question. How many words does your baby say? It's everywhere, right? The pressure to count words, to measure milestones, to chase that magical First Mama or Da Da. But after 35 years, I can share with great confidence. Words are one of the last skills that emerge, not the first sign that communication is actually developing. And you might be thinking, wait, what? Erin, that sounds crazy. Words are a huge milestone. You're absolutely right, they are. But they actually show up only after months and months of wiring and building, practicing and. And connecting. So let's step back together and look at what are the fundamental skills underneath those first words? Even before gestures, which we talked about last episode, before babbling and before pointing, there is one invisible skill most parents never really notice. And honestly, professionals often just glance right over. But I assure you, toddlers cannot talk without it. It's imitation. And let me be very clear, I'm not talking about imitating words. I mean all the layers of true imitation that come long before speech. Once you understand this, I promise you will see your baby and your young toddler in a completely new way. Today, let's uncover what imitation really is, why it matters more technically than words, and why this one skill predicts talking better than any other milestone. Welcome to Talking Toddlers. I'm Erin, a speech language pathologist of more than 35 years who has spent thousands of hours in clinic rooms, real homes, real kitchens, real floor time play across the board, helping little ones and their families understand how communication truly develops. This week is special because my workshop at the end of this week. So stay with me until the end and I'll be able to share more about that. But for now, let's get talking. Or better yet, let's get to. To imitation. I've experienced this moment dozens, honestly, probably hundreds of times in my career. A mom walks into my office with her 16, 18 month old on her hip. She's a little nervous, he's a little nervous. And she begins to brace herself. She kind of whispers with the sentence that I've heard over and over again, he's not talking yet. Should I be worried? And then she tries to kind of make sense of it or rationalize it. Maybe he's just shy, you know, he understands everything, but he just won't talk. Well, her little boy clings to her shoulder. And as they kind of walk into my waiting room, he starts looking at everything, checking out the toys. There's sun kind of streaming through the shades. He looks at my face and you can see that he's really checking this place out, this new vibe. Right, right. He's wondering, hmm, in his own way, making a decision. Is this safe? Is this comfortable? Who is this woman? Do I want to get down and play with these kind of interesting new toys? Well, they take a seat on the bench, and I settle down on the coffee table as I usually do. And I give him both time and space to adjust. I kind of talk to mom casually as I'm always eyeing the little guy. And here's something that most parents don't realize. My sessions start the moment that you walk through that front door. And so I'm collecting information. How is he understanding and engaging in this world? And how does he use a wide variety of communication to either understand or get something or share, maybe, right? So I smile, I give him a little wave. I even raise an eyebrow wave again, all playful, gentle invitation that I'm not a bad gal, I don't bite. Right? He looks at his mom, he looks back at me, gives me the tiniest of smiles, and then he kind of waves back at me. And before he ever makes a single sound, he's already communicating with me. His eyes, his gentle gestures, his looking around, collecting information. And so together we head off to the play area, which I always pre select my toys. Keep it very, very simple. Nothing electronic. Nothing that lights up or sings or distracts. At this age, I really do have one hard rule. No batteries. And that rule is really deeply personal to me. And it's been around for decades. Actually, in the early 1990s, a colleague of mine, a clinical psychologist, we opened a small toy shop next to our practice, and we called it no Batteries. Because we believed even way back then that children deserved tools that will wake up their brains, not toys that actually do the work for them. I believe that toys aren't there to entertain. They're tools to study and to use to build a new skill that we call human communication. So I pull out all of my trusted favorites, always. I start with Mr. Potato Head. A few farm animals, a little barn, a couple of tiny people. And I love those. Keep it simple, keep it basic. And I actually have Mr. Potato Head right here because I think this is one of the best tools or toy sets that always delivers. And so I gently, you know, take off his shoes and make it walk across the table. And he's looking at me like, what the heck is this lady doing? And I talk to myself, to him, to anybody that'll listen. But I play with the tools and say, ah, where's my head? Where's my head? There it is. And I put the head. Oh, let's get together. I say, you know, oh, no. Now I need a. And I'm looking around. I'm looking around. A hat. The shoes need a hat. And I look at him, and I kind of anticipate. Can you help me? So I pick up the hat. He's still a little, you know, uncomfortable with this new person, this new environment. I give him space, but I'm starting to show him what we do here, right? Oh. And I look at this hat, and I look at him, and I say, where does that go? Can you help me? And I pause, right? And I look at him. Can you help me? And he starts to smile. He watches with some curiosity. You see, my voice is inviting. It's inquisitive. And so he picks up on that vibe that I have, a playful tone. He may not understand everything I'm talking about. He might be familiar with a few of the single words. Right hat or shoe. Right head. And I stress those. So he's starting to put together these tools, or also known as toys. My gestures and actions and my words. So I put the hat on my head. I do something that's unexpected, that's different. And he looks at me, and he's like, what? And I go. And the hat flies off. And if you're watching me on YouTube, you can see me demonstrate. I've done this thousands and thousands of times. And he looks at me because that was unexpected. That was different. I just kind of shrug. I say, oh. So I pick up the hat again, and I put it on, and I look at him. And this time, he knows what to expect. He anticipates knowingly, right? And smiles at me. And I know I look kind of freaky here, but this is what you do with babies and toddlers, right? And he just squeals. I've done this seriously thousands of times. But this time, I hand the hat back to him. And so far, there's been no real communication except, you know, some small giggles out of him. But with no words, he takes the hat and he gives it back to me. And he's saying to me, you do it again. And I give it to him. So I model one more time. The hat falls. He picks it up. Now he's really engaged with me. He's eager. And now I give it back to him, and I point to his hat and I say, you try, you try. And sure enough, he looks at me, looks at mom, looks at Potato Head, takes the hat, puts it on his head, he starts the sneezing game. And right there in that moment, that's imitation. That's symbolic understanding. That's early problem solving. That's human communication, deep communication, long before words. I teach him something that's unexpected. I model it for him. And then he imitates me. Now we've built a relationship. Now he's like, okay, you're not so bad. So we move on to my second favorite thing. And if again, if you're watching on YouTube, you see that this here's a little barn set, right? And I look inside, and again, I make it interesting. I want to be the most interesting person or thing in the room. It's a basic farm set. And I look inside. Hey, cow. Woo.
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Cow.
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And he's looking at me once again. He's thinking, what the heck are you doing? But I'm exaggerating my words, my playful movements. But he's watching everything. So I pause and I knock again. Hey, cow. And he's looking at me like, what is she gonna do? So I hand him the barn, and I say, your turn. So without really batting an eye, I am looking at him with my eyes and my body posture and my giving of gestures, handing him the barn. And he takes it right away. He looks. He waits for a second, you know, go ahead. Knocks. Cups his hand and makes some kind of. Ow. Ow. Right? But the key here is that he is following my lead. I'm showing him what we're going to do here. We're going to play together. We're going to use actions. And these tools will help stimulate or facilitate communication and playfulness. His mom is looking over at me. Like, wow. Because it's not that he was saying moo or cow perfectly. No, it wasn't. It was just some kind of guttural sound. But for the very first time, mom began to see and believe his potential and what it takes in his personal environment to really support that and facilitate that. And how we, as the adults, especially if you have a child who's apprehensive or slow to talk, that communication is built for months and months and months, like I said. And we do it in a playful dyad in which he is free to practice. And the truth is, I tell parents this all the time. Your child takes interest in no matter what, because I take interest first. The toys weren't speaking to him. I mean, Mr. Potato Head is cute, but he doesn't talk. I was. I was the model. I was using them to create connection, to build purpose. I wasn't just talking to the kid, you know, having a social conversation with him, not at 16, 18 months. But I use these tools to invite him into a shared moment. And he was responding long before he ever even tried to utter a word, looking at me, following my lead. And so in that one session, this little sweet boy followed my lead, copied my actions, joined my rhythm, imitated my sounds or at least tried to, anticipated the routines, shared in my silly joy, right? I was having fun. I always have fun with babies and toddlers. And he used his body, his face, and began to use his voice. So I would look at him that he wasn't actually behind as much as he was teetering on that cusp, waiting for more support and direction, waiting for more opportunities to explore his voice, right? He needed more modeling. He needed a patient environment, and he needed to feel connected, to kind of let go of verbal communication, which wasn't coming easy for him. And at that moment, mom finally saw how capable he was and how willing and interested he was that he wasn't just roaming around, around the toys all the time, not knowing what to do, that he really could be intrigued into trying something. And the truth is, you as a mom, and she, at that moment, never want to label. She came to me because she wanted guidance, right? We had talked on the phone before they entered the office, and she wanted to. To really understand what her role is. How could she help him? She wanted to help and support his growth, not just put him in a box and say, oh, no, he has a challenging developmental issue, right? She was really looking to me to show her how to parent differently, how to show up differently, honestly, because none of us really are Informed of what it takes, right? Unless you were a teenager or a 20something and you've always loved kids and you always played with kids, right? But everything in that story, and it's a true story in which had reoccurred in my offices for years and years and years, the waving, you know, the eye checking out that little hat game, the barn knocking, trying to say moo or any other animal sound. All of it is imitation. The actions and the verbs or the actions and the vocal attempts. Imitation is one of the most critical building blocks of learning how to speak and use language as young children and as humans, right? But that imitation helps form the foundation, right alongside gestures, which I talked about in the last episode. In fact, you truly can't have gestures without imitation showing up first. And so I always talk about gestures because I think they're more visual, of course, to parents. And then we can look at what imitation is. So we need imitation and then gestures and then we can build on single words and phrases. So imitation tells me a lot. When a child can imitate me like this little guy, it's telling me, excuse me, that your child is connected. Your child is watching and interested. Your child is processing things in his world and he's picking things up and learning. It's also telling me that your child's brain is wiring pathways for real speech because speech is symbolic and symbols grow out of imitations with gestures. That's how these pieces fit together. It's really. I've looked at it as the invisible skill that most parents, and honestly, most professionals overlook or simply kind of gloss over. We might notice that they imitate us, but we don't realize how incredibly important that is as a building block. Imitation, especially paired with gestures, and I look at it as this, like one, two, punch together. Imitation and gestures highly predicts your, your child's Future speech at 3, 4, and 5 than any other milestone that you'll see on that chart. And as I said, it comes long before the attempts to say real words. A quick reminder before we keep going. My live workshop, how to get yout Baby Talking, is happening this Saturday, December 6th. If you're ready to stop second guessing and start using simple daily routines that reliably help real words emerge, this is for you. I'll walk you through the exact steps I've taught families for well over 35 years. And if you listen to the end of this episode, I will share a bit more at the end so then you'll know exactly what to expect. You can save your seat in the link Below, down in the show notes. I would love to see you there. Let's get back into imitation. So let's simplify this, because children don't grow in a perfect straight line, but there is a general pattern beneath all of this early communication. The earliest steps are rooted in the reflexes that we're born with and the mirror neuron system. And over time, they become more and more voluntary and less reflexive. Right. And your child will be more purposeful in imitating and trying to do different movement patterns, including speech. But if you want a deeper understanding of how this all begins, you can go back to last week's episode 131 after this one. And, and I do talk more in depth about the mirror neuron system and how it all gets started. Here's the progression, though. Let's just kind of walk through how this works and, and keep in mind that imitation is woven all throughout these stages. So first, your baby in those first few months has that reflex of cry, right. Those first attempts to communicate, I need help or I'm uncomfortable. And then they begin to have vocal play, those cooing sounds, squeals of delight. And they're really beginning to experiment both their oral motor movement. As their sounds are coming out, they also will. Will do a lot of facial gestures, like the eye opening and closing and raising of the eyebrows, smiles open and. And like, ooh, ah kinds of things. And then they move into more volitional gestures. And volitional just really means on purpose. Right. They begin to imitate the waving or clapping or even pointing. And that those really start to emerge, consist consistently around 7, 8 months. Imitation is really measurable more at copying actions and your facial expressions, routines. I, I remember my daughter, after we would brush her teeth, she would tap her. Brush her toothbrush on the sink twice. That's what my husband did. Right. But the facial expressions and sounds really start to emerge on. On purpose. And then you'll see closer to two, two and a half and three more turn taking. And that's that rhythm of dyad interaction. Right. I put a block in, you put a block in. I, you know, spin the die. You spin the die or roll the die, all of those things. They're not really, it's not cooperative play yet, but they're beginning to understand that you contribute, then I contribute and vice versa. And they will imitate our actions. And then closer to three and a half and four, you'll see more sharing and more cooperation. And again, they're really learning from each other. And those are the early Seeds of social understanding. Of course, they're picking up social tidbits here and there, but the. The overall understanding doesn't really start to click until through three and a half and four. But then you really understand how they have enough of the word bank that words become more symbolic to express things, and they act less and speak more. But if you notice, words really come at the end of this, this list, right? It's not in the beginning, although there are that cooing and crying and babbling and a lot of vocal play. But words for your word list is really closer to the end, right? So imitation itself will also grow in layers. So you don't. At this stage, you don't need how this works. What I want to do is look at what it looks like and what that. What you can measure at home. So let's look at eight levels for imitation for a toddler. And when I say toddler, I'm looking at 10 months to 24 months. The first one is actions with objects, right? Shaking that rattle, banging some blocks, tapping on the table. They will do gross motor imitation. The second one is gestures with body movements that might be animal sounds, right? Cluck like a chicken or be an elephant with a big trunk, those kinds of things. They also like to imitate marching or hopping. All of those kinds of big, gross motor. Reaching, waving, pointing. All of those gestures are really starting to emerge around 8, 9, 10 months. Or the animal moves really kind of come out closer to that first birthday. And then facial and mouth imitation, like I said, the wide eyes, the gasps, the squeals, fake coughs, fake sneezes, like in, in my story that I shared with a little boy. And then number four would look at the vocal play and sound effects, and that's a pretty common one. Again, when I'm looking at a young child, I will grunt. Like if I'm trying to take off Mr. Potato Head shoes, can you help me? You know, But I make noises. And then the child easily comes in in the next session and is grunting or snort like a pig, or snort, snore like you're sleeping or saying the sh, sh, sh to the baby. All of those vocal play and sound effects. And then number five kind of on this hierarchy is emotional exclamations. Like if, you know, you eat something, yuck, yuck, right? Or if it's sticky, yuck. Or something yummy. Or hooray, whoops, sorry, hooray, hooray. Or you drop something, oh. Or they don't want something, they can say no way, right? They're not really saying no or way there. But it's a phrase. It's a social, emotional exclamation. Yeah, man, that kind of thing. And then the next imitation is social routines and early songs such as Ready, Set, Go or some of your favorites, Peekaboo, Ring around the Rosie, that was always one of my favorites because it's good to move. And as you look at all of these things, there are movements involved, right? So this is where gestures and imitation is really married in the processing and the maturity of understanding. And then of course, you know, wheels on the bus, head, shoulders, knees and toes, those kinds of things. And then number seven would be functional words. And functional just basically means that it's important in their environment, right? It helps them get things done. All done. Bye bye, choo choo, mama. More or even naming body parts, right? Nose, ear, shape, shoe, please. Those kinds of functional words that they've heard thousands of times and they're easy or easier to imitate. And then number seven are short phrases that have meaning to them like my dolly or cookie, please, high gamma, right? Those are different because they have two different single words that work together to communicate something. And then there's these things called holistic phrasing, which it might be two or three words that you and I would count, but they see it as a whole phrase, right? See ya. Where'd it go? Or I got it or all gone, right? Those kinds of things that's counted as one as a single word, even though it's a holistic phrase to you and me. So when we look at this eight level process or maturation, that little boy that I described in the beginning, he was solidly working through levels two through five, right? He didn't need pressure to try to imitate words. He needed an attuned playmate partner to someone that he could follow, right? Who saw him where he was and then pulled him in to the task, right? So imitation tells us so much with where your child is acquiring this whole multi level human communication system. It tells us that your child is connected, right? They look, they notice, they join, then they respond, they try to imitate is also telling us in the early stage that mirror neurons are firing. And that's foundational in those early months because that's really how we, we kind of prime the system for human learning. God wired us that way on purpose. And it's also telling us that their brain is wiring the understanding of symbolic thought that pretending to sneeze is, is. I'm thinking of how to act that out without Saying the word. Right? Because you look at imitation and how that moves into understanding and meaning, and then it builds. It's like this bridge to building true words, which is another form of symbolic understanding. It also tells me that they're, they're learning the rhythm of communication. And that's what you want. You want them to, to watch you and then take a turn. And in watching, they're demonstrating that they're waiting, they're absorbing information, they're sharing in that moment, and that's huge. And so these, these elements in gestures and imitation, I just want moms to understand that it's, it's really giving us insight of what's happening neurologically. Right? And they're, they're practicing speech long before they attempt speaking with words. So action imitation always comes before imitation of sounds or that then begin to lead into words. And even those, those environmental exclamations like coughing or sneezing or snoring or shushing, all of those are slowly putting the vocal skills in and representing what they're thinking. So this is why imitation really is the number one predictor of talking with your three year old or four year old or five year old. And it comes before gestures, like I said. And, you know, if you listen to last week's episode, you know how much I love, love, love gestures. So it's important to understand how it's not, like I said earlier, this perfect linear line that they're, they're embedded and crossover. And the more time you spend together, the more time you'll see what's happening in those moments. So I, I want to share with you what you can do at home, what you simply can notice, starting today, to help you understand where is your child on this developmental journey and how do you, how do you meet them where they are? Right? So the first thing is, do they copy your movements or your gestures? Right. Do they mimic your silly faces? This little boy loved to mimic my silly faces. Do they join in with the rhythm of your play? Like when I take Mr. Potato Head and I walk him across the table, do they try to do that? Right. Do they repeat how you use the toys? Especially if it's something that's novel or different or unexpected? Do they try to use sounds like the ha ha ha chew? Right. I don't think he ever really did that before. Most kids didn't until they meet me. Right. But do they try your sounds and your playful noises in context? And then the fun part is they'll come back to it and they'll initiate that and Then you can look at do. Does your toddler anticipate routines and join in because they know what's coming, right? And. And then you can look at how they will look at you like he did, and then try to copy and then look back, like needing confirmation, like, did I do that? Right? Or did you see me do that? Like I'm as good as you are, right? Right. If you're listening to what you can look at and notice and if you're nodding, that your child is building the right pathways for the precursors to speech. But if imitation feels maybe a little, little inconsistent or weak at this point, it doesn't mean that something is wrong. And I want to be pretty clear with that. It simply means this is where you can focus. And I say that a lot, especially in these first three years, because there is a lot of difference. But there's always patterns underneath. And so it's not just how many words do they have by two, it's what's happened until that 24th month. Right? So I'd like to give you some reassurance at this point. You don't need to chase these words or try to get them to imitate spoken words. You don't need flashcards. Those are the worst things with little ones. Or labeling drills. What's this, honey? What's this going around your house, labeling or the grocery store? You need to play, you need to be present. You need to model and make it intentional. Keep it simple and easy. Clean out the toys. Especially as we're going into the holiday season, you want to remove some of the stuff, because I know that you're going to get more stuff, right? And thin it out. They don't remember what they opened and what they didn't open. So even if you get some wonderful toys, put them aside until a couple months from now, right? Because you need imitation where they start with the actions and some gestures, big gross movements, silly faces, and build that into your daily routine, daily life, your play time, your household chores, your activities. And I know that any mom can absolutely learn how to do this and be cognizant of it. And here's something I want you to hear from me personally. This was never natural for me. I. In my early career, I tried everything possible to stay away from working with toddlers. They overwhelmed me. They were sticky, they were unpredictable. I didn't know how to play with them. I felt clumsy. And getting down on the ground and trying to be interesting to them, I had no idea. But truly, I kept being pulled back to them again. And again. And so I knew in, you know, my intuition, my Holy Spirit was talking to me, that I needed to learn how to do this if I wanted to make a difference. I had to learn how to be present with them, how to learn how to follow their lead and then expand on that play and really how to speak their language long before they actually spoke mine. Right? So their language is. Is action and play and gestures and getting into stuff. I needed to interpret that and build upon that first. And I learned it slowly, over time, patiently. And a lot of trials and errors. Right. But I used real children and real families and real classrooms and real moments to hone that skill. It took time. So please hear this. That if being playful and present and tuning into your little one doesn't feel natural to you right now, that doesn't make you a bad parent or a bad mom, and it doesn't certainly put you behind anywhere. You're really at the very beginning of all of this, just like I was. And you can absolutely grow these skills and hone them. And with that, that is why I created my December 6th workshop. It's a live workshop because I kept thinking about you moms and dads, but you parents who have babies from infancy all the way through 24 months of age. And this workshop is called how to get yout Baby Talking using three simple daily routines. And this episode, I gave you the what and the why, kind of the roadmap of what, imitation. And last episode, I gave you gestures. But inside the workshop, I'll teach you the how. How to implement, how to really play right. And how to build those imitation through everyday life activities. How to strengthen the foundation for speech long before they try those real words, or if they're trying a bunch of real words, maybe they're unclear or maybe it's inconsistent. But how do you feel confident and prepared? And how can you show up and want to parent in a proactive position? Because I think we can avoid a lot of struggle and a lot of worry and. Right. So if you want clarity, if you want to support your baby or your toddler with intention, if you want to understand what truly matters before those real words start popping right, I would love to see you there. And there's the link down below. I just want to give you this opportunity and invite you to. To dig a little deeper. Right. You're not alone. You're not expected to know all of this. Nobody is. When we first become a parent, a new parent, I meet you where you are, so then you can meet your little one. Where they are. Right. You're learning on the job together, both your child or children and you as mom and dad and grandparents. And imitation is a beautiful beginning to spoken language, to human communication. Right. And it's the precursor, like I said, to gestures that then lead into real words. I believe every mom is in the perfect position to hone these skills and make a true difference. And I'm right here with you in these early years because they matter the most. So thank you for spending this time with me. God bless you. God bless your little one. God bless your family, especially in these holidays. And remember, you're not alone in these little years. I'll see you next week in Talking Toddlers. Take care.