by When Does Baby Start Talking The First Word
Talking is the most powerful way for children to interact with their surroundings. Speech development is important to a baby’s development. If a child is unable to communicate verbally, he or she can easily become frustrated and even socially withdrawn.
Babies start getting used to sounds right from birth, many babies right in the womb. By the 3rd – 4th month, babies really start to practice talking. The process of learning to speak takes place within the first 3 years of life with constant changes that demonstrate the baby’s ability to absorb and learn extremely quickly.
Stages of Verbal Development in Babies
Your baby’s verbal skills will progress through stages as their vocal mechanism matures and as they learn to relate to their environment, Artemenko says. First, vowel-like sounds at birth move to “coos” and “goos” at 2 to 3 months. Babbling starts around 4 months of age. So you will hear lots of “puh puh puh,” “buh buh buh,” and “muh muh muh” sounds initially.
Here are some ways to help your baby’s speech and language development: Engage in a conversation by talking to your baby. Pause after you say something so that they have time to process your words and “respond”. Use different tones and syllables so they can try to imitate you and learn new sounds.
When Do Babies Say Their First Word?
Born to 3 months old: At this time, babies often hear the soothing and lulling sounds of their mothers. Your baby is just starting to make his first sounds, mostly single vowels, like ahhhh.
2 to 3 months old: The main language that comes out is crying. Crying manifests differently in different situations. As you get to know your baby, you’ll be able to tell the difference between a hungry cry and a tired baby cry.
3 to 4 months: Baby makes more complex sounds and starts babbling making sounds like “muh-muh” or “bah-bah”.
5 to 6 months: Your baby begins to practice intonation, volume, and pitch in response to your words and facial expressions.
7 to 12 months old: Babbling sounds more varied. Your baby tries to imitate your words with phrases like “bah-bah-bah” or “dee-dee-dah”.
12 months: Babies begin to say meaningful words. Children have the ability to imitate some of the words in a phrase you say.
14 months: Babies change intonation more and use more hand gestures to express speech more clearly.
16 months: Baby says more words, starts calling you “mom” to get attention, nods and shakes her head in yes-no questions. Your baby begins to pronounce consonants like t, d, n, w and h.
18 months: Baby has a vocabulary of about 10-20 words, including the name “mom”, some verbs and adjectives. Baby is able to say the simple phrase “want the doll”.
18 to 24 months: Baby begins to say phrases of 2 or more words for more novel purposes.
When to See a Doctor
Remember, children develop skills at different times. As long as your baby’s chatter is progressing and they are engaging with you and others, there’s likely no need to worry. But if their speech and language development stops or regresses at any point, if they are not babbling and making eye contact or gestures, or if words don’t emerge by the time they’re 15 months, schedule an appointment with your pediatrician and a speech-language pathologist
