to looooooooathe babytalk?

[Babymumma]

Specificaly from mil!! She has a special voice she uses just for ds and a whole other language which includes: din-dins, tweety birdies, milky and bot-bot! grrrr, it's dinner, bird, milk and bottle. We don't use babytalk as I find it patronising and wangt him to learn to speak correctly. He has recently started to say "Ba" to our cat Bonnie which is really sweet but when mil is here she will repeatedly and very loudly say "Joseph where's Ba?Ba?Ba?Ba?". I'm sure he will find his own way of pronouncing words which is fine but if you repeat his version back to him he wont learn the correct pronounciation will he? AIBU?

YANBU. I've tried not to speak in baby talk to my children, but my dd2 pointed at a picture of a duck recently and said 'quack' when I asked her what it was.

actually baby talk is the ideal way for babies to learn to make the sounds needed for 'proper' talk. By saying ba, the baby is focussing on just one simple syllable - with time, thay then is able to be built on to make more 'words'
(can you tell I have done the development of language in a recent course )

"thay then is able to ".....where the hell did that come from !! Apologies pedants

You're not being unreasonable to dislike it - it can be very irritating, but one person speaking to your son in that way is very unlikely to affect how his language develops - he's getting exposed to it from all sorts of sources, and will pick up the most "standard" form in time. I'm often now quite disappointed when dd drops her own version for the standard - will miss "effafant" when it goes.

He'll put her in her place eventually.

My MIL used to do this until the day dd looked down her nose at her and said "Nannie, that's not a gee-gee; it's a horse. I'm surprised you don't know that!". Nannie has rarely used baby-talk since.

You are the one he will hear most of the time, and it is you he will learn from; what you say will be the word he will use.

We had ethelutes for elephants, Habbibu.

I miss the ethelutes.

Oh, Whizz - I remember an article about that - "motherese", they called it - was quite interesting reading. Not sure that the very twee sort of "baby talk" is necessary, mind - dog is good as doggie, I reckon...

See, I have no problem in the baby using baby talk & figuring out his own way of pronouncing things coz that is just cute. However; from a 63 year old woman it just sounds daft! Her latest is to anounce to him "Mimi go wee-wees now, I'm goinmg wee-wees"!! Ewww, just get on with it & then wash your hands, we don't all need to know!!

I'm a SALT and let me tell you that 'baby talk' is pretty much essential for normal language development.

I'm a SALT and let me tell you that 'baby talk' is pretty much essential for normal language development.

Humans are hard wired to perform linguistic acts which facilitate comprehension and therefore communication.

Like ethelutes, sh! very elegant.

Def not unreasonable, I am living at my mums at the moment and my step-dad talks to my DD1 (22 months) in the most awful high pitched voice, squeaky voice. It makes me want to rip off my own head. It's not that he doesn't say words properly it's the awful voice he constantly uses.

For example, talking in a high pitch, simplifying words by repeating key syllables,using rhyme.

i quite agree YANBU it is super irritatin g when people over use baby talk my DD is repeating everything she hears nowadays and it is annoying when i have spent alot of time trying to teach her the proper names of things like dog/cat/horse and similar when someone usually my M or MIL come along and start " sianie where the woof woof, tat, horsey worsey([bleurgh])" i usually just smile and repeat the real names straight afterwards it is a relatively harmless but supremely irritating habit of many but i wouldnt worry about it too much
xx ei xx

lol Whizz

I had a deal with dh, no baby talk, it is appalling. Until we had a baby. We don't come up with the stuff ourselves, but we do have a good time using the words she's come up with, and it's probably wrong reinforcing those wrong words, but it's cute and funny and she can already say them so it seems a bit mean correcting her.

Moondog, I can see that it's essential for the child, but is it necessary for the adults to use it as well in order for the child's language to develop?

It seemed more natural to me to speak normally - dd was perfectly able to understand the words I used, even when they differed from the imperfect version she did.

And she never, ever, EVER said din-dins, bot-bot or gee-gee ... despite MIL's best efforts!

I think YAB(somewhat)U.

There is a book called 'Babytalk' by Dr Sally Ward which you might find interesting.

Also, let your mil be a grandmother fgs.

Moondog, I get the simplification of speech thing - I find myself talking in the third person a lot, for example, but do you think the examples bm cites are a bit beyond that? We don't really do that at all, though we do use those words that dd herself uses if we like them, and her language is coming on apace

yep, agree with Moondog - the high-pitched special babytalk voice is important for language development - is technical term "parentese". would have thought more sensible to model the correct word back though rather than repeat the wrong one deliberately.

UI don't mean for kids to do it although of course they do.Am referring to adults.
Vast body of research supports it.

only trouble is that when they near school age you have to unlearn all these previously cute terms. And my mum hates the fact that ds still calls her 'yaggie' ( a young atempt at grannie - she thinks it sounds like daddy and is convinced people take her for my lesbian partner)

Sally Ward was top SALT.

I think it's vital when they are babies, just a little embarrassing when they are five! One of my very good friends does this to my children and it really makes me laugh, but then she does also tuck their trousers in their socks so they don't get cold legs!