Babbling & Beyond: What No One Told You About Noisy Babies

Is babbling just a cute stage—or a sign of something deeper? 

In this episode of Talking Toddlers, Erin dives into the often-overlooked world of prelinguistic development during your baby’s first year.

Drawing on 35+ years of clinical experience, Erin explains how babbling builds the foundation for speech, how movement (yes, even tummy time!) connects to oral motor skills, and why quiet babies need your attention—not just patience.

You’ll learn why consonants and vowels matter, how feeding and communication go hand-in-hand, and what those sweet squeals, grunts, and coos are really trying to tell you.

Plus, get a sneak peek at what happens when screens disrupt this critical learning window—and why your baby needs you more than any device.

If you’ve ever wondered “Is my baby on track?” or felt unsure about what babbling should really sound like, this episode is for you. 

Let’s connect the dots between sound, movement, bonding, and building a confident communicator.

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Mentioned in Episode:

Patricia Kuhl, PhD TEDxRainier 2010

https://www.ted.com/talks/patricia_kuhl_the_linguistic_genius_of_babies

Transcript

Erin: 0:00

there's even studies supporting how the baby, your newborns will cry with an accent, with your accent. In other words, they've heard mama's speech especially her nonverbal, elements, right? The prosody elements, the rhythm to it, the intonation, the volume, all of that. and so they're, they will match their cry to whatever the native language is. So I think that's pretty remarkable that learning begins in the womb. Not even when you first, hold your beautiful baby. here's why I think all of this is so powerful, 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 vocabulary. We're gonna 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. Every mom loves to hear her baby babble. Those sweet little coos sighs gurgles, they seem almost magical. But here's the thing, babbling isn't just a cute phase. It's an actual critical stage of development. And while you might think your baby's doing just fine, what if I told you that many new parents miss early signs of delay? Not because they're not paying attention, but because they simply don't understand what babbling is and how best to support it. So in this episode, we're going deeper than just the milestone charts. We're unpacking what your baby's brain, body and mouth are working on during that first year. We are gonna take a good look at how movement, attention feeding, and social connection all shape his or her ability to communicate. And by the end of today's conversation, you'll know more than just what it sounds like. You'll know why babbling matters. You'll know how babbling or how to support babbling. And most importantly, you'll know when to act because noisy babies, they're on the path of becoming a confident, chatty toddler. So welcome back to Talking Toddlers, and if you're new here, thanks so much for joining us. I'm Erin, your host. I'm a speech language pathologist and early interventionist, and most importantly, your trusted guide in these early parenting years. If you've been tuning into this particular miniseries, you'll already know that we're diving deep into what quote unquote normal development means and how to apply that to those developmental charts or milestones. Because it's much more than just checking off boxes. It's, it's moving beyond that pressure that you're feeling. Am I good enough? Are they okay? Are they on track? What am I not seeing? Or what am I not understanding? And it's definitely beyond that oversimplified advice that you might get at your pediatrician's checkup. and no offense to my Pediatric, doctor colleagues, but their cursory understanding of development might be a little incomplete. And I know that you want to know more. I know that you want to stay ahead of it and really jump into that driver's seat and know how to navigate through these early years. So just as a recap, in episode one, we explored how milestones are really a reference point. They're not rigid rules. They're not even set in stone per se, as we know that there, there's some mobility in there, some, some fluid, zigging and zagging. But the key here is that they weren't really designed to measure progress. They were started back in 2004 actually, just to start conversations. the design and the, purpose of them is really to get your pediatrician, who doesn't really know all that much about specific development, but to help them start a conversation with you. And they weren't supposed to shame or make you feel like you're messing up or even scare you, that like, oh my gosh, they don't have very many. What do I do? Right? Because what a pediatrician actually does is check off a few with you, and if you're not quote unquote hitting the mark, they just refer you out. So in episode two, we zoomed in on specific milestones around movement, Because it's been in the conversational flow for the last couple of years because the CDC kind of took it upon themselves to remove a few and to, expand some of the expectations. We don't all agree, but I wanted to give you some insight from my perspective and what the, pediatric therapists are thinking about this. So in episode two, we looked at how crawling, walking, squatting, climbing, all of those big motor movement really shape your baby's brain and his or her nervous system. So we're, we're wiring his neurological networks, building them from the ground up and then we're connecting them to his whole body, right? His torso, his upper motor neurons I talked a lot about and lower motor neurons. the limbs, right? But in today's episode, we're going to bring it back together to focus on one of the most exciting signs of development in my biased opinion. And it is, that's babbling, right? Because babbling will move your child toward toured. Clear articulated speech. And so I, I think that we rush through some of these early, early developmental stages because we don't really understand the importance that they're there meant to help your child m build the skills and build those networks. Right. So let me start by clearing something up. First words don't typically just appear one day, right? And first words, first clear words. And when we talk about single words that a child will say over and over again independently for. Purpose. Right to, to actually communicate or request or ask or confirm. Right? But these first words come after months and months of building blocks that many parents don't really recognize. And the truth is, teachers, as I said, pediatricians, uh, special educators even don't understand. Babbling is really the gateway to language. And language is how we string those words together to make phrases and sentences and conversation. Speech are those individual physical sounds that we make, right? The BBB is different than the GGG, and so babbling being able to. Uh, to practice the sounds of their native language. And we'll talk about what all of that looks like is really the gateway to the whole language processing the speech and the speech sounds, the expressive language and the receptive language. And I just wanna highlight someone who really made a difference, not only in, in my clinical practice, but in in early child development and in language processing, right? A woman named Patricia Kuhl, and she's really a renowned neuroscientist, and I think she's still in the position of a co-director at the Institute of Learning and Brain Sciences at the University of Washington. But Dr. Kuhl really coined the phrase that babies are born, quote unquote, citizens of the world. And I've used that phrase. Thousands of time probably, and I'm sure you've heard me mention it here, what she means is that every single baby born in the whole world is born with the ability to distinguish and distinguish just means to auditorily, perceive, and hear differences between the sounds of all languages. And I think that that's incredibly poignant that we need to consider this, that every single newborn, whether they're in Africa or Chile or Canada or if they're a healthy full term, typical healthy newborn, I. That they have the capacity to really distinguish all sounds of every culture, and it's somewhere between six and 12 months, typically around eight. We start really seeing a, a change, right? That somewhere around eight months of age, they begin to specialize in the sounds of their native language, the language that they hear most often. And yes, you can teach a newborn or a baby or a toddler, two or three languages as long as they're hearing all of those languages relatively equally. But Dr. Kuhl and her colleagues really conducted a whole battery of tests in the 1990s, and then again in the early two thousands Using head turn techniques. And then later on, as technology advanced in the two thousands, really started using MEG imaging and EEG imaging. her research demonstrated that newborns can discriminate, phoneme, and a phoneme is the smallest unit of sound that changes meaning. And I use these terms not that you have to be tested or you have to understand them, but, there's a lot of jargon in every field. Right. But a phoneme is important because, and I know I've shared this with you all before, but there are 26 letter names in the alphabet in English, but there are. 42 to 44, depending on where you speak English phonemes and phonemes are the different sounds that all those letters can make. And so a newborn can discriminate phonemes from all of the languages, not just their native language, right up until about 6, 7, 8 months of age. And then at that point, they start to prune or lose sensitivity to their non-native phonemes while they then increase their sensitivity to their native language/. and I remember in the 1990s when Dr. Kuhl and her team started really sharing their, their work with us and we're like, wow, at eight months of age, they really no longer perceive sounds that aren't in their native language. And it was, it was poignant to me there in southern California, because some of the work was comparing English American babies with Chinese babies, and that the Chinese and the American English speaking babies could auditorily discriminate the R and the L equally well, up until about eight months of age. And then the Chinese babies no longer could perceive or distinguish, they couldn't even perceive it, meaning they couldn't even hear it or they're, they weren't aware of it anymore because the R and the L aren't sounds phonemes in Chinese. And so it was, it was really a turning point in our, in our field, right? Linguists and, and speech and language pathologists really zoning in on the auditory skills of newborns and within that first six months and 12 months. But what, what's happening in that, that first year is that it's really part of that whole neural commitment to being able to wire itself and focus in on the dominant language because it's not important for, uh, well, it's nice to be able to have two or three languages, but the whole idea is for you to build a relationship with your primary caretakers. Right. And that, that that's what makes us human. And it's part of our survival. Yes. But it's also part of becoming human and wiring the verbal networks, so then you can make sense and learn from the, the beautiful people that are taking care of you. So that's just a side note, but I, I think it's, really fascinating to sometimes step back and look at what babies are capable of doing. If we give them the environments to do it. And, and if you want to hear more about this, Dr. Kuhl gave a Ted talk and I think it was in 2010, and the title is The Linguistic Genius of Babies. And it's really where she introduces the phrase of citizens of the world. And I just think the way that she explains it to a, to a a lay audience, a wider audience, is really quite brilliant. And she's a great communicator herself. I'll have the link down below just in case you wanna go there. But I think it's, it's important that we, we accept and embrace the brilliance of how our beautiful babies are, are designed by God, I believe in, in God's purposeful design for us to grow and learn through this three dimensional world. With us as the guide, right? With us as the steward. So when we look at those early sounds right, we get through those first four or six weeks, right? That babies really do start to coo with intention, That they're soft vowel sounds you usually hear at six to eight weeks of age, right? Within those first couple of months. That they've migrated from these undifferentiated cries to more purposeful, differentiated cries. You are learning about them and they are learning about you. And then you'll hear a lot of, um, glottal sounds right. That's in the back of the throat and vowel sounds. Right. There's, and they're single like, ah ha. Right? Ooh. And they're learning how to you move, make movements on purpose, blow some bubbles, do some of those coos, gurgles a lot of sign, and they really begin to imitate us because in those first six to eight weeks, those first coole of months, we imitate them first. And then they're like, oh, wow, I can have this, this two-way conversational flow with this beautiful person that's taking care of me. Right? But. Somewhere around four to six months, they start experimenting with consonants and vowels, right? So those first three to four months is really just vowel sounds because the only thing that they really, uh, or the, or the first thing that they begin to master motorically in their mouth is that jaw And their lips. and so they'll go, ah, ooh, And, and so then four to six months consonant sounds, you'll hear bababa, dadda, Those are the easiest. And it's, it's pretty universal in, in most cultures that the, and the, and the, um, will, will start to emerge. Those are the easiest sounds for us as humans to make. That's where Dadda or Mama Papa all came from. Right. But that's initial babbling. But the vowel sound is usually the same in that, that short little syllable there, that consonant vowel. and so you'll, you'll be, and I'm sure you've seen it online if you haven't already experienced it, but it's really purposeful, rehearsed communication. They're playing with their voice and their articulators to try to share with you. And it's, it's your baby working out how to control their lips and their tongue and their jaw and their breath. And that goes back to why tummy time is so important. But that's what we call oral motor development. It's, it's looking at the cooing and the babbling. It is looking at that, that share taking, right? That turn taking and sharing of just noises, right? It's a huge part of communication that ties directly back, as I said into episode two about movement, right? And that's why tummy time and, and being free on the ground to be able to move their body in space is really allowing them to then focus and hone in on a lot of these small fine articulators in their mouth, right? here's where I think we can really overlooked. That babbling is progression and that it evolves. And, as a, a speech therapist, I can certainly, get into the weeds of looking at the progressive steps, but I want, most people, especially new moms and new dads and new grandparents, I wish other allied health professionals would, but I want them to be able to hear and see the difference, right? When they move from cooing, which are just vowel like sounds. To initial babbling. So the first one would be repeated syllables of the same syllable. And we call it canonical, right? It's the same. And then they move toward more complex forms, variated ones, and that's where they change the consonants. And then they can change the consonant and the vowel. So they need to mix it up, like body gga, boo boo boo. Yeah. And so they're really trying to play with the consonants and the vowels. That takes a lot more fine oral motor movement, right? But when they start to add differentiated consonants and vowel shapes, we call them shapes, right? It, it's really recognizing that I can stabilize my body, stabilize my head, and just move my jaw. My lips, my tongue, my even my palette, right? So the soft, we have a hard palette if we run our tongue on the roof of our mouth and then we have that soft palette and we hope to close off that soft palate when we're drinking because we don't want liquid to go up our nose. Right? Well we have some nose sounds right. So Mm. Is a nose sound. And we can go, mum. But if I plug my nose and for you watching the video, you'll see I'll plug my nose and it'll sound closed off. Right, right. But if I do the same with Babababababa Baba, if that's a B, not an m, babababababa baba, it doesn't change. So just that fine motor, control of the soft palate to close it off. And where am I gonna push the air outta my mouth or outta my nose, right? And so they've learned how to coordinate that, not on a conscious level, but through all of their sucking and and swallowing patterns. And then as they move into that six month and you're introducing solids to them, now they're doing it with chewing and biting and swallowing. So again, the oral motor planning comes from speech sounds and noise making as well as eating and then we need to kinda look at the same time as, as they're experimenting with all of these sounds with co articulation, they're also experimenting with what we call the nonverbal side, right? The intonation. And the pitch and the volume and the rhythm. So you want a lot of variety. you want to hear them do it with themselves, right? Vocal play, talking to themselves and with others. And so those nonverbal elements to, the intonation, the pitch, the volume, the rhythm of it, that's what we call prosody. And it really is the music quality of speech. And the prosody for English is going to be different than German, which will be different than front French. Right. And there's even studies. And this is another, rabbit hole we can get into. But, but there's even studies supporting how the baby, your newborns will cry with an accent, with your accent. In other words, they've heard mama's speech especially her nonverbal, elements, right? The prosody elements, the rhythm to it, the intonation, the volume, all of that. and so they're, they will match their cry to whatever the native language is. So I think that's pretty remarkable that learning begins in the womb. Not even when you first, hold your beautiful baby. But here's why I think all of this is so powerful,

23:59

it shows up across. Cultures and languages and geography across the world. Right. And so let's talk about four very specific, elements to this, the cooing and the early babbling, and how verbal and non-verbal elements to it fit together. So the first is that babies are born with this rhythm sensitivity. Right? And like I just said, that it, it starts or we've been able to identify it, that it will begin to really develop, in that third trimester, right? That babies begin to hear and respond to the rhythm of their native language, right? Especially the moms, because that's what they hear, the clearest. And so, yes, they can hear loud noises. From the outside, but it, it's, it's not even remotely the same as what mama's voice is and all of that, how should I say, say it. All of that malarkey like music with Mozart and all of that stuff is not, Uh, the science doesn't support that at all. So, and that's another conversation. But, but the interesting thing is that across the cultures during this period, we've also noticed that that Sing Songy or mothers e or Parent Ease, we, we've now changed the title that we call it because men do it too and older children do it. But that's that sing song, exaggerated, a Slower tempo, um, a, a higher pitch even that comes naturally to us, the grownups and the older children. And that's where we build nursery rhymes on that whole concept and nursery rhymes. Are truly cultural as well, so it supports the rhythm of the language, right? And babies are born with that rhythm again, if it's a healthy, pregnancy. and unremarkable, I love that word for births that they're unremarkable. Everything went as planned without a hitch, right? But, um, nursery rhymes are also really memory friendly. And so they're building your, your baby and toddlers auditory skills, right? Because there's a lot of repetition. There's rhyme and there's that rhythm. of your native language and all of these support. What I look at, when I analyze someone's speech and language skills, right? They're auditory processing. They're gonna hear it over and over and over again. You know, think of, um, row, row, row your boat, or Twinkle, twinkle little star, right? But it's also building what we call phonological awareness. And as I said earlier, a phoneme is a smallest unit of sound that can change the meaning. And so let me give you an example of that. So when, and put this in the context of rhyming, right? Think of Dr. Seuss. But when I say Matt Kat. Right. So the ah part or at part stays the same, the root of the word, and we only change that very first sound that mm, and the right, that phoneme, that changes. And when we sing a lot of nursery rhymes, or we read a lot of, rhyming books like Dr. Seuss, that's just the best example. We're building in what we call the phonological awareness. Again, your 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, even your 7-year-old isn't going to be able to explain to you what rhyming is, but they'll know it when they hear it, right? Because they've had enough auditory practice to, to literally strengthen that skill, that auditory processing skill. For phonemes. So phonological awareness is not phonics. Rhyming isn't phonics. Phonics is when you move into the letters, those black squiggly lines, right? but it, it's, exercising literally what I call an auditory space. When we sing row, row, row your boat gently down the stream, you know, hundreds and hundreds of times, Or any nursery rhyme. And again, this is true across cultures. And then nursery rhymes also build the vocabulary, because they're typically around things that are important to them that are in context, it also builds nursery rhymes, build predictive skills so they can anticipate what's gonna come next. So once you've heard this song 3, 4, 5, 600 times, but you can say, RO row, row your boat gently down the, and they can anticipate, they can predict what, even if they say eem. So they've, they've gotten the most critical elements to the word stream. But STR is gonna be hard for, you know, an 18 month old or a 2-year-old to say. But they've gotten the rhythm, they've had the auditory practice. They, they're phon logically aware of this, some of the sounds, right. And now they're predicting and anticipating what comes next in that rhyme. And again, this is cultural across the board, look at Twinkle, twinkle Little Star in English. You can look at Farrah Jaka. You can look at even Nani Nani, which is the lullaby and Arabic. They're very structurally the same. So now the third element to nursery rhymes and what's happening in this first six to 12 months is that they begin to connect, sound, all this noise making to meaning. If you think back those first three months, it was just vocal play. It was building that relationship, right? It was connecting, taking turns, sharing, imitating, right? And now we're, we're building enough sound within structures that are following words and, and sentence structure rules, right? That they're beginning auditorily to understand. Oh, certain things mean certain things. Like this is glasses, this is, you know, a little bity toy, or whatever you wanna call it. Or a book. Or a bottle. Or a shoe, right? They're beginning to make sense of these auditory patterns. And then that helps your baby really tune in and listen for what is important for us. Those word boundaries, right? As they begin to understand where one word ends. And the next word begins, that there's structure. That it's not just, even though, even with fast talkers, there's still boundaries into the word structures, right? They're also tuning into those intonation patterns, right? As well as emotional tones. And they can, they can understand when something's getting excited and when something's scary or dark or, I'm not sure, right? So there's a emotion that goes with the rhythm and the pitch and the tone, especially all of those non-verbal elements that I mentioned. But it's, it's important that, again, that we're not just looking at some of these quote unquote baby elements as a cute little stage, right? That they're really for centuries now. Centuries upon centuries have been used to help build and get your child to be competent by their second birthday, right? I mean, by their third birthday T they typically can have a full fledged conversation with you by their second birthday. They can tell you what's the matter. They can share something exciting. They can, be really creative with both verbal and gestural and acting out and miming and all of this. But they really are building that foundation to communicating and sharing. But the rhymes in nursery rhymes and in books really feed that. Right? And as I said, the fourth element is that it really is supportive of Cultural identity, right? Because it's, it's true for all languages, right? And it really helps that social connection. And, and, and I've shared this before that, I used to go and consult and advise a lot of different preschool settings and sometimes it's organized chaos, right? Especially if I enter in the beginning of the day and kids are trying to settle in and they're waiting for everybody and they're trying to maybe sit down and in circle time and which is a whole nother conversation. But, um, it's inappropriate, I think, for most preschool and, and especially toddlers. But I can go in there and get complete command of the whole environment just by sim simply. Singing a nursery rhymes, and usually it's ring around the Rosie because everybody's familiar with it. It's really, really simple. There's motor planning, it's connection, right? We all hold our hands. We slowly go around the circle. It's highly repetitive. And every child, the verbal kid, the not so verbal kid, the big kid, the little kid, they all jump in. They all know, right? It's part of our culture, part of that social connection. So it's important. Again, when you do these things, don't just think, ah, you know, it's just for fun. Or It is for fun. I mean, the truth is that it should be for fun, right? And we should be, um, we should enjoy. This, this time together. Right? But because they're part of our culture, they're part of our, our childhood, it should reinforce that pleasure feeling, right? And that know that they're being passed on. And I, I'm afraid a lot of parents aren't going there anymore for lots of reasons. Um, but I, I want to bring it back to that because it's not just part of our culture and our generation, but I think it, which I think is important, but it really gives you a tool that can reinforce and encourage, encourage, is is the primary word there, that face-to-face connection, that one of the most potent drivers of early brain development is connection, right? Is spending time and doing it. With them. And I think that that's, I'm afraid that a lot of us are losing that. And, and if we don't understand that it's not just, um, for the heck of it or because it's cute, that it's really literally growing the brain and connecting those neurons and building neural pathways at the same time supporting their native language. Right. And you know, there's meaning to it because as I said, it, it, it goes across every continent, right? And that you're gonna find parents using some form of rhyme and rhythm and song and repetition to help their little one, not just entertain them, but we're really, really. Giving exercise to the auditory, to the verbal, right to the motor planning and wiring the brain, So just think about that, whether it's a little lullaby or a chant or a bouncing or just you, whatever you're doing, you turn it into song that will bring them into whatever the context is and help them attend. so let me address something that I think often comes up as a comment or a question. And I've mentioned it here before, but I think it's really important that we're always looking at some of the misunderstanding out there, right? So someone might say, oh, my brother, my uncle, my sister, he didn't talk until, you know, she was three. Okay. And now she has a master's degree, or now, he runs a large company. I hear that probably at every one of my presentations, right? And I get why people say that. I, I think we say that to reassure ourselves, to reassure somebody else if, if we're talking about specifics, but in my 35 plus years of clinical practice, I have yet to meet a child who truly had no words. I, I'm not quite sure whether they had the cooing and the babbling and if it was differentiated babbling. But quite often you can see a very. Noisy toddler, and it takes them a little extra long to get their, their sounds in an organized fashion, and then they're understood. But rarely is it that they're not practicing right with that ping and babbling. Whoops, sorry. Um, and then they just start talking in, especially in full sentences. so I, I just want to put a little asterisk there. I think most of the time we, we miss some of those soft signs early on with the cooing and the babbling and, how much babbling and how differentiated is it? and I think that. there's another piece to that that quite often, yes, about one third of kids who are late talkers will catch up on their own by the time they enter kindergarten. And that statistic has been relatively sound my whole career. I don't know if that's true today, if, if the data will reflect that in the next five to 10 years, because I do think since the whole, uh, covid pandemic, lockdown and all of that, things have shifted not for the better, I. But, um, I think it's important that we also recognize that if a child does quote unquote catch up on their own, by the time they enter kindergarten, they're still in a risk group. Because many of those kids will look okay on paper when they're five or six, but they continue to lag behind. And so the gaps can then become wider and wider as they move into more academic and literacy type expectations. Right. And, and the, I think the important piece is that we have so much more information now that Dr. Kuhls work, um, ha. And, and her colleagues,'cause there are other people in the field as well, really have, embraced. Uh, this study, right? And that technology has allowed us that we can understand what's going on so much more today than we could even 20 years ago or 30 years ago, right? And so my my point here is that I, I never ever want to panic my list listeners, right? I want you to think of all of this information as how can I be proactive? How can I, sift through a lot of this information and understand how to support my little one through each and every phase, right? That language delays are so much easier. Speech and language delays or any developmental delay to, it's, they're so much easier to address early on. And I know that you know this in your head, but. I spent most of my career helping kids on the other side. They've already kind of fallen off the cliff, right? And, and we're jumping in downstream trying to put life jackets on them and, you know, give them a buoy to support them and, and help compensate for some of the deficits that they weren't able to, to really close on their own. And so it's just so much easier to help the kids who are teetering, right, when they're 1, 2, 3, than to see what happens when they're five or six and when they enter the academic arena, So that's just kind of my PSA on on all of this. You know, lately I've been looking at, you know, how can I help you really understand that? we want to reduce the risks. And not roll the dice, right? That you, mom, dad, grandparents are really in the driver's seat. And that based on your daily choices, some of them big, some of them small, you can really move that needle and keep your, your child moving forward. Not in a perfect linear fashion, right? But there's going to be dips, but we're always moving forward. And, and that's what development is really all about. Um, and 2, 3, 4, 5 steps forward, maybe one back. at this stage, let's take a look at what does this mean for you as a parent? And, you can look at the cooing phase You can look at the, the babbling phase. You can see. For the next six months, from 12 months to 18 months, are they acquiring new words? and basically why is it important that you want your baby and your toddler to be noisy and chatty? that you, when they're young, you want as much grunting and growling and squealing and chatter and noise, right? so we don't wanna shush them. We want to encourage them. And sometimes when they're just making noises by themselves, leave them be right. But when you are in it with them, be present. because knowing that the more sounds they're making, they're really experimenting, right? And we want them to move toward a handful of vowel sounds at three months of age to. dozens of sounds by their first birthday to mastering all, 44 sounds by their, their second birthday, right? And you want them to keep exploring that. As I said, you are in the driver's ser driver's seat, right? You are your baby's first conversational partner when you coo and ah, and e and glee together. So if you are responsive, they're gonna be responsive. If you mirror them, they will begin to mirror you, it's both the verbal and the nonverbal. from the smiles to just changing your lips and your jaw closing, your eyes, opening your eyes, banging on the table. All of that is, is getting them to understand they need to be an active partner too. That it's a two-way street, this whole conversational flow, right? And that they, they listen and they share. They share and they listen. They think about it, they change, right? And it's really about connection, right? That speech isn't just about the words, isn't just about the sounds, but it's really about connecting and sharing your thoughts and your feelings or expanding by asking questions. and so. You're, you're going to get mixed advice about, oh, you talk to your baby all day long. Talk a lot, especially when you're together, right? If you're changing them or if you're sitting him in the high chair and you're sharing, his first introductions to solids, those 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 months, share the meals with him and talk to him. Putting him in the car seat. Talk to them. Take the phone, put it in your purse. Be present. Right? Narrate. You hear that a lot, what you're doing, but it doesn't mean that you simply, talk like you're reading an encyclopedia, right? That there needs to be, I. There needs to be purpose to it, that you're hoping to connect these words that are coming outta your mouth with the immediate environment. Like if you're washing your hands or if you're sharing a sweet potato, right? Or if you're putting on your shoes, it doesn't have to be, let's sit down on the floor and play with these trucks, or these dollies, or this, you know, whatever cooking tools it, it is using spoken language to build their attention, their interests, their curiosity. And so just describe things, you know, make up songs. I was notorious for making up songs. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Go back and say, ah, they are citizens of the world, so they need to prune away what will not serve them. All of this engagement is building your baby's receptive language. Right? And receptive is how well they understand. And that's long before they actually speak their first true words, But at the same time, they need that oral motor. They need to figure out, how do I control this airflow, inhalation, exhalation, phonation? How, how do, how do I make different sounds on purpose? So let's just expand a little bit and, and put these three pieces together, right? For this mini series looking at. Motor movement, looking at what are these milestones suggesting to us? And then looking at speech, tummy time, that then leads into, crawling, that then leads into chewing and eating and how they all fit together. And like I said in episode two, that tummy time isn't just about building the core strength, right? It's about building that stability and being able to then move smaller parts of the body, It's also not just about preventing a flat head because we're, we've, we've placed our babies on our backs all the time. It's about being able to strengthen. There, fine motor movements, so it then supports eating and talking and attention and memory and all of these other higher order things. We see kids that have skipped a lot of these early developmental steps, milestones, phases, whatever you wanna call them. And they're in different risk groups, right? But it makes sense. If we have good neck and jaw and shoulder stability, then they're going to be able to sit in the high chair and they're more relaxed in their body and they can practice biting and chewing and swallowing. And if you strengthen tho the same motor planning or motor skills for oral motor planning than babbling and talking, they're all developing at the same time. Right. You look at four months and five months and six months and seven months and eight months, that span in particular is really, you know, you can kind of think of it as the seed is, is breaking through the soil, right? And that you're, so much has happened under the soil and now it's really taking root, so all of the movement is critical for breath support and articulation, like I've said. all of this is not coincidental, the oral motor exploration with, with objects and, hopefully they're just playful objects that they can safely, non, or, or their body, their own body parts, right? Um, but they're, they're exploring that with food and with toy objects because that's what the oral cavity is giving them. But at the same time is prepping them. all of those, those experiences on their, their tummy and crawling and pulling to stand. It's helping. Wire the brain so they can do fine motor and gross motor skills together. so think of this first year, especially this first 6, 8, 10 months as a pre-game, right? and helping them move toward good eating habits and then good speech. And it's never just about the nutrition and it's never just about, oh, getting him to walk, right? It's about. Like I've mentioned in the previous two episodes, in this miniseries, it's about the progressive steps that are wiring the brain, connecting the brain and the body, and then the body and the brain can connect to this three dimensional world, and it's really helping them build it from the inside out and the outside in. And that's why as we move forward, I'm going to speak more clearly and, and, and specifically on why screen time, especially in these first 2, 3, 4 years is really, really a slippery slope. And, and if you listen to my reasoning behind movement and speech and play and sharing, it's in this three dimensional world with another human being, So this is how all of these things go together in introducing solids encouraging them to get on their belly and use all four limbs and to, you know, move across the floor through motor play. And there's motor play in, in introducing solid foods as well as their toys, like I said. So all of these are coming together at the same time, and it's not a coincidence. I like to look at it as, this is the magic piece that pulls all of this together. Is that engagement, That being in it with them, and I'm not saying 24 7 and giving it all, but I'm saying that you, you snatch these moments, especially as you're introducing something new, like you're moving them from the bath to putting your clothes on, right? Or you're moving them from the high chair and you're wiping their face in, in those intimate moments. That that engagement, that connection is really helping them learn that communication isn't in isolation. It's not about naming things. Oh, what's this? What's this? What's this? What's that? It's really about. Connecting with other people with intention, And that you're, you're sharing these experiences through, um, positive eye contact and giggles and facial expressions and, and imitation. And all of this is, is what they coined as serve and return, right? It's that tennis term. and it's really helping them feel connected, wire their brain and understand how they're supposed to act or be or engage with this world with, with the people that, that love him and take care of them. and with, with themselves. How, how can I sit down and, and play with this puzzle? And entertain myself because I've had enough of the grownups in my world that I, I'm not so needy on them. But part of this is, is also giving them that, that white space, right? So you can say something to them and then wait. Right? Or if you first put them on the floor and they're interested in something, then let them be, right. Let, let them reach out for that toy or see if they can organize their body and move toward it on their own. And you're, you're there quietly. you're you. And if they get frustrated or if they look back at you, then you can encourage them. So there is an art and science to this whole parenting thing, And that it's, it's really helping them. Through the minutia, right? And helping them connect those smaller elements. So then you're, you're beginning to see the whole picture. And so just to kind of put this all together or connect all of the dots. Let's think of what cognitive skills, these movement skills, and then you have your speech and language. They're not developed on these separate tracks, and that's where I think these developmental charts can get us stuck because we're compartmentalizing everything, but they're really woven together and they rely on one another to to build. Remember, cognition is an intelligence, but it's in their understanding of their environment, their understanding of how they can interface with their environment and learn or grow or build or create or just enjoy, right? But when your baby reaches for something or rolls or begins to crawl and pull to a stand, they're building those brain pathways that support. Attention and focus and listening and memory. And when they play with their voice, they're developing that fine motor control that they need for speech and articulation that then physically supports what they're thinking or what they're gonna problem solve. Right? and in the last episode when I talked about the gross motor, right? The big muscles, when we lock eyes with each other, right? Your baby, your toddler, when we smile, we're forming that social emotional bond, right? To motivate them to communicate verbally and non-verbally. And the, the gross motor helps support all of that fine motor. And so, like I, I've referenced in future episodes, very near future, next month actually, I will explore very specific questions around screen time and what the research is saying, what US specialists are saying. And I want you to be able to overlay that on all of this important developmental information that you're, you're, listening to and kind of sorting through, right? But screen times, and this is a new phenomenon for us, right? That the, the quote unquote smartphone was invented in 2006, right? And we had things leading up to this, right? We, uh, we can look at that historical. But even in small doses, it really can interrupt this natural rhythm and and dull their instinct that they're born with. Right? That, that babies want to connect, they want to engage with other humans, right? They want to communicate, whether it's through cooing or babbling or reaching and grabbing or snuggling. All we're wired. And, you know, again, God was brilliant to give us reflexes in the beginning, and then we reinforce those reflexes and we build a relationship with one another within the, you know, first coole of days, coole of weeks, coole of months. Right. But for now, I, I want you to really try to contemplate that I. It's your face, your voice, your responses to your baby, and your toddler and your preschooler in real time that are the most important learning tools. And, and I think this is true for most of his or her childhood, That the screen is flat, there's no depth. It's not in sync with me. It can't give me any nuances. It's overstimulating. And we're gonna talk about that, the pros and the cons and what the evidence is suggesting. And then I want you to be an informed parent, right? To be proactive to think about how I can navigate around this. But I wanted to kinda walk through these milestones, as a multi-layered process, And I, I want you to think, when you hear that term milestones, think of them as like little signals, right? That help you navigate of what's working, what's not working, what might need support, right? And how can I encourage that? How are they linking up together? Right? Maybe, you know, he's not tolerating the high chair very well, which then makes him disengaged and fussy around food because they haven't spent a lot of time on the floor, whether it's through tummy time or crawling. Maybe we need to back up a little bit and spend more time on the floor to build strength and, and comfortableness, right? If, if we're strong in our body and we can sit here comfortably, then I can have a conversation with you or I'm, I, I can relax my, my gross motor skills and just reach for something that looks interesting and explore it in my face. Not, or in my mouth not knowing, ah, this is food. What's food? Right? I've only had a breast or a bottle up to this point, right? But I, I want you to understand that the, these milestones are really, like I said, just a gauge and hopefully. You can use them to start a conversation with pediatrician or another developmental specialist. Right. But trust your gut. If something feels off nine times outta 10, you're right. And if you feel like anybody's dismissing you don't wait and see, keep asking questions, keep going back and spending more time with your little one and, and building your understanding of how are all these dots being connected. Right. because like I've always said, or I've said here today in, in other, in other episodes, that if you are informed, then you can be proactive. And that's our goal here is to stay ahead of the whole developmental process and to, to know that you. Can avoid a lot of delay, a lot of developmental challenges that unfortunately we're, we're trying to readjust to. And the goal isn't just, like I said earlier, checking the boxes, That we want to understand how they fit together. Because in the end, what's our big goal? To raise a child who is curious and connected and communicative to raise a child who is eager and energetic and and interested, right? And, and I want you to picture that they're not all gonna grow up and be orators. That's not what I'm saying. And, and I've shared this with families over the years, but we want them to have the skill and the confidence to speak, to imagine, to share, right? We want that three and 4-year-old to be chatty and able to answer questions and ask questions and, and tell stories, and, and learn how to relate to other kids, and we want them to almost drive us crazy, right? So, like I said, telling silly stories, asking a thousand questions, eager to, you know, to look at books and, and figure that what's going on, on the page, right? And, and the truth is that child doesn't get there by accident. The, and, and I get really uncomfortable when they say, oh, kids are resilient. Kids will work it out. They'll figure it out. And there, that's true. Kids are resilient. We are tenacious in, in surviving, but we don't want our kids just to survive. We want our kids to be, to reach their own individual full potential. And maybe they are creatives and they can build stuff or, or they can draw things or they're athletic or they sing or, or maybe they are just oral communicators, right? But we want them to have plenty of skill so then their choices aren't ever limited, right. That they can continue to, to build upon this. Because that's how we're we're designed too. God was pretty brilliant in saying, with enough practice in anything, we can get better. So know that that first year is really laying those. Those building blocks. That's and making that foundation really solid, through connection and movement, and introduction to mealtimes and babbling and first words and nursery rhymes and nursery books. Lean into all of that, right? Be present. Encourage a noisy baby, a curious toddler, and recognize that you're shaping this beautiful toddler to be the best that he can be, that That it's not just a baby and not just a teller. And we need to get through these phases that he really is a human being. Learning how to communicate, how to relate with other human beings, how to build relationships, how to be socially mature, that social emotional stability, And no matter where you are on this journey, whether they're six months or 16 months or 26 months, you can always step back and look, where are they today? And how can I support them? Or how can I close up some of these gaps? and with that in mind, I want to remind you that May is better speech and hearing months for our national organization, which is American Speech and Hearing Association. as long as I can remember, may has always been better speech and hearing month. So I will be starting my small group, coaching program, and it will kick off in the middle of May. if you've been feeling unsure or overwhelmed or you just need a little bit more real time support, then this group is for you and we will go deeper. You will learn exactly how to guide your baby and your toddlers development at any phase between birth and three years of age. That's, that's the one caveat there, right? I don't go into preschool age, but you'll have direct access with me. It'll be a small high touch coaching group. Right? There'll be other moms that you'll also have a lot of access to that you all can share because you're in it together and there's no perfect answers. I, I want us to be clear that, with intentional small tweaks here and there, we will be able to make big change and big growth. Right. so get on the wait list. There's a link down below in the show notes. You don't wanna miss this chance to really find some clarity I don't want you to get stuck in a catch up mode. I want you to know and feel confident and really take full advantage. So this summer can be the best summer ever. So keep talking, keep playing and share those meals with each other I look forward to seeing you in the next one. Take care. Bye. God bless.