to be concerned at how little I seem to talk to my toddler?

[innishvickallaune]

Ds (21 months) is home this week (chicken pox). He hasn't been ill at all with it, barely has even scratched.. but we have been at home now for seven working days, nine days in the house and I'm surprised at how undemanding he is of my attention.

My SIL works in a Children's Centre and she is always rabbiting on about how kids need to be talked to and you need to be down at their level and commenting on what they do etc.. but this just doesn't come naturally to me.

I am feeling really guilty I don't play more with him. Every day, we have come down here and had breakfast together, then he just plays away happily in the corner with his cars and buses.. he calls me if he is stuck "duk! duk! and even says "duk!" and signs "please" to get me to help him. He comes over and asks for drinks, he shows me things and about once or twice an hour he plops books on my lap and we read a few. Once or twice a day we have a bout of singing e.g. sleeping bunnies and incy wincy etc.. or he'll point out an "incy wincy" (he thinks anything that looks like a stray hair or bit of fluff is a spider) and we'll play.. or he'll spot some things that are the same and start counting and I will count along..

But when he is playing with cars I just... don't... have anything to say. When he was little and I was on mat leave I used to sit on the floor and play with him all the time, but now I feel downright neglectful.. he just gets on with his thing and I get on with mine and I stay away unless he calls for me. He doesn't particularly like you to direct his play so things like jigsaws and blocks he wants to do alone, he'll have a few mins of ball play here and there and when I am normally about (usually work a four day week, dh too so he has one day with me and one with dh) we always do something like baking or painting and obviously I chat through this..

But my SIL says that the major distinction in language development is the amount of words a child hears and that children in higher income families hear 1,000,000 more woreds than children in lower income families by the time they enter school. I doubt that's true in this house.. it's pretty quiet here most of the time.. She has been hinting he should be combining words and understanding longer instructions and I don't think he can, he can say about 60 or 70 words though?

Am I just the crappest mother ever? And if so, what do I do about it?

Try this site for more accurate information. www.talkingchild.com/chartvocab.aspx

they change he will start talking at you soon and you will sort of engage then he will talk to you and want answers and want you to play with them more (sometimes its fun others times you lose the will to live) the talking and questioning then never ever stops from the moment they wake up until they sleep - enjoy this peaceful time

he sounds happy, maybe go for a walk and chat to him. ds was late in talking he has certainly made up for it

i do the narration as well mammys just going upstairs to sit on the toilet where its quiet

my dd jabbers constantly tho so ive no choise but to talk to her

700 words an hour is 11 words a minute, and it's an average figure.

I think, rather than worrying, maybe you should click your phone on to record next time you are chatting and count the words. I bet you what you like you are meeting this average and more if you are reading a few books once an hour, singing, doing things like baking/painting etc.

I am also an SLT and while your SIL's advice is grounded in terms of research in language development, it's not really her place to give it to you. That's her job, she is your family.. it's usually best if the two don't mix. It's also arguably not the whole picture, either. Language development is complex and can't really be reduced to soundbites.. most of the research we have is based on mother-child dyads in middle class homes with monolingual parents. We have good reason to believe that parental input is important and we have some clear pointers as to features of parental input that may be important but it isn't easily reducible to soundbytes e.g. "use simple sentences", "take turns" etc. It is more fluid and dynamic than that.

I also have a son who's 20 mths and here is an example of a two minute conversation earlier.

^Want to go outside? Right, we need to get your coat. Where's your coat?
(looked for coat together) - Is it under there? No honey, stop that. We're not pulling books out right now. Come here, let's put your coat on. (Ds runs into other room). Ds! Come here. Do you want to go outside? (Ds - Yes) Okay, coat on. Hands out, that's right. We need your shoes too. (Ds shuz) Where are your shoes? (Ds shuz) There they are. Foot out. Push.. push.. push.. (Ds shshshshs) Wanna close it? (Ds zhozha). You closed your shoe! (ds udda wa). The other one? Foot out. Push push push. Close it. Right, coat's on, shoes on. Mama needs her coat and shoes now. Where's that coat? Yeah, there it is. Now we need to find the key. (Ds TEA!!!) Where is it (Ds points at the shelf where it normally is) Umm, no not there. I think it's upstairs. Shall we go and look for it. Where's the key? Key, where are you? I found it! Let's go! Want to bring Wilson? Yeah? Go get him!^

This is upwards of 100 words in two minutes. Do I talk like this all day? No. Is it more a reflection of my poor organisational skills than anything? Probably. Should everyone make a meal out of going outside like I do? Definitely not. Is my child massively overdeveloped because I squeeze in so much blabber many words into a simple routine? No, he probably has abotu 60 to 70 words too.

Language development is a massive area of study, and while there are definitely indicators that point to children hearing language around them as being very important, putting a figure on it is not particularly helpful. Language transmits social, familial and cultural values as well as following a developmental trajectory. There are individual differences that may be important. There will be parents who talk to their children more or less nonstop because this reflects the culture and values of that family. In other families, independence is more prized as a value. That "exploration" may be teaching your child valuable skills in terms of persistence and problem-solving, mathematics (conservation etc) and spatial ability. If your child isn't responsive to your attempts to e.g. play blocks and do jigsaws, there's no real need to become involved. As others have said, your child will develop and it may be that RIGHT NOW developmentally, what he needs is to focus on posting or sorting or moving items between containers and language is taking a back seat to that.

Take your break while you can. Enjoy reading a book or MNing or sitting on your fat arse for a bit if you want, it won't last.. that's for sure. You are doing plenty. You do not need professional help to do better because your SIL has a job in this area. Your child is using a very average number of words for his age and you are doing LOADS.

If you like to read about this stuff , this one is quite sensible. SOme can rabbit on for hours to small children, for others its difficult I agree. To me, the sooner you can get the child gassing on for hours and you only have to say "yes" "really?" "I agree", the better. That is the kind of book that helps

Sorry - a) it's my fat arse I am thinking of, yours may be terribly svelte and b) I wrote the soundbite/byte thing twice. My word-related diarrhoea is not confined to narrating trips to the garden it would appear..

I dont think youre a crap mum. Just wanted to reassure you my dd is 22 months and a couple of months ago was probably saying about 15 words. Now about 60 words and strringing two together "mummys chair", "daddys book", "white doggy", etc. All objects appear to belong to someone so thats generally where the first word comes in (daddys chair). It happenend really quick, she suddenly seemed to discover that talking was communicating and got something back from it. As an aside, I also think she was saying more words than I gave her credit for, the babble sounded like babble, but now i actually think she was trying to say the correct word but I couldnt decipher it.
Youll probably fing theres a leap in his speech soon too.
I dont talk all day non-stop, but will often comment on mindless rubbish now and again (oh, look its started raining) and get down on her level once every 20 - 30 mins for a chat and to get involved with what shes playing with but I only stay focussed for 5 - 10 mins if Im totally honest.
I do think its good that he can play for so long without your attention though and thats a useful life skill too (to be able to concentrate on something).

My little boy was always like this, I do think its his nature. He can happily occupy himself but he knows I'm always happy to play etc. I I think its quite healthy tbh. I know a few children who are very demanding and they just haven't received barely ANY attention so can't really see how your SIL can say that. Its just how children are :shrug:

Ds is the same age and would hate me to play cars with him! I would only do it wrong and he gets frustrated!

I make sure we spend a couple of a day doing things like colouring/puzzles/mega blocks/baking and then talk the whole time doing that.

One thing I didn't mention before (not sure if anyone else said), try to get some eye contact in, not constant just at least a few times a day, especially when wittering about what you're doing together. It helps the toddler to see how your mouth forms the sounds of speech.

I have learnt this all the hard way, btw....

If anybody says that mothers parents in the "old days" days did more of this stuff they're talking rubbish. Mums in the old days were too busy being house proud, working, watching soap operas, cleaning house, scrounging a meal together, sneaking whiskey, turfing kids out at the first opportunity, they never sat & just wittered lots & lots to their LOs either.

Have another child. Or two. Thats what I did anyway...I don't play cars with my children, or much else, thats what they have each other for.

This obsession with being the font of all learning for our children is a very modern one. Do you think your mother sat down on the ground and played with you all day, singing you songs and chattering baby talk? Do you think her mother did, or hers, and so on?

Its such a load of nonsense.

You sound like a lovely mum, and don't let SIL undermine your self-confidence.
I didn't get down on hands and knees to play with DD at 21 months, she wouldn't have been very interested in my input TBH. I felt much less self conscious about sharing books and rhymes and songs together. That was much more my style.

You sound like you are achieving a good balance to me. You interact appropriately, you read stories where appropriate but you also leave your child to direct his own play a bit. Children like unfettered play and they need time to explore the world safely without being constantly directed by adults.

Hearing a lot of spoken language and witnessing other people interact is important for language and social development. But it doesn't have to be (and probably shouldn't be) 24/7.

Totally agree with ragged that parents in the past didn't spent all their time chuntering on to their children. It wasn't just being houseproud or having me-time. My grandmother had 6 kids in 8 years between 1942 and 1950, worked from 6-12 each evening as a cleaner to make ends meet when Grandad was out of work and was probably too knackered to speak most of the time. All of the children from that deprived impoverished background with nary a Baby Einstein DVD to their names gained degrees and two of them are now university professors.

Siamo, I hear what you're saying and you are right.. but also remember that society and culture have changed, and the changes in child rearing practice reflect broader shifts. It is exceptionally difficult to gain employment without good literacy and so called "communication skills" these days. When my great grandmother raised her kids, she was raising them to work in the docks or in their homes, this expectation wasn't really there. A wealthy relative (by marriage) had a governess at this time. My grandmother, in contrast, put great emphasis on "book learning" and singing nursery rhymes and doing times tables and ABCs and her children became the first of our family to go to university.

I am a bit at some of what I hear my fellow SLT's say with reference to language development, because some of what is really quite significantly quite disabling about poor language development now is disabling because of what society expects e.g. there are teenagers who are perfectly well able of having a very functional conversation who are deemed (and are) disabled because they can't keep up with the language demands of the curriculum. You need NVQs to do most jobs now, some of which are paid very poorly indeed. So parents worry about a normal range of language development difference now more than they might have done (e.g. I am not talking about serious and profound disabilities here but where language is simply not a child's strong point).

vocabularies are diminishing over time, not increasing, I can't agree with you that we have superior communication skills to our parents and grandparents, not in the slightest. I think its just a function of making more of a deal about it. We think we are advancing when in fact we are sliding inexorably backwards.

Children absorb language like a sponge, you don't have to be constantly pouring it directly on to them. Sure, if you are concerned you aren't speaking to your child enough make an effort to do it more, but it really doesn't need all the criticism and angst.

Interestingly, the single biggest/most accurate predictor of a childs vocabulary size is its parents economic status.

I haven't read the whole thread, but just wanted to tell you about my DS - he hardly talked at all until he was about 3.5, then came out with full and quite intricate sentences. He is still a quiet soul but has done really well academically and socially, so please don't worry. Some people are more natural listeners than chatterers.

I think stranded bear's narrating is a good way of talking to babies. If you feel bad just change the way you work, maybe read to him or narrate or just find some playing games where he answer back to you

I don't think that our communication skills are "better", just that there is more emphasis on the use of a specific set of language skills across a greater range of employment. There is huge emphasis on language and literacy in education, much more than there used to be. I am not saying standards are necessarily higher, but the expectation that university education is the key to a well-paid job is relatively recent.

I very much doubt that vocabularies are diminishing over time, is there any evidence for this?

oh yes, plenty of studies suggesting shrinking vocabularies for the majority of people.

Really? Where? I am unfamiliar with any of this work.

I agree with you, working9. My vocab is massive compared to my parents and theirs would be massive compared to 3 of their 4 parents (my mother's father was probably superior to all of us, mind). I can't quickly find anything like an authoritative ref online for either side. I suspect DH can roughly say the same.

This looks like a thorough discussion & has an ambivalent conclusion.

Really, you are? Then it must not exist....

I am naturally a non-talker and much prefer doing things with my DD - eg baking, gardening, walking, museums, reading stories - rather than down-on-the-floor playing. However I've seen the benefit my DD gets from talking a lot with her and playing with her more (not all the time though) as she lights up and so obviously loves it when I make more of an effort. So I've had to force myself to be a more chatty and playful mum and it becomes easier over time. DD plays a lot on her own and has an amazing vocabulary and communication skills but I honestly believe that it's because I've forced myself to play and talk with her more than I'm naturally inclined to.

Oh, also wanted to add that at 21 months my DD wasn't terribly bothered whether I played/chatted much with her. She became much more demanding once she moved into the pre-school age of 2.5+ years.

No, of course you're not crap. You don't have to chat to him about his cars or anything else in particular, but it's an easy way into lots of concepts if you do ? that's the biggest car, that's a bright red car, I like the blue car etc. At his age, it's fine just to talk about anything ? shall we go to the park this afternoon, I wonder if daddy would like spaghetti for tea and so on. Sing songs ? nursery rhymes, pop songs, traditional hymns from your schooldays. Language isveryimportant, so the more input the better.