Nonsense words. To be discouraged?

[IcouldstillbeJoseph]

DS is 3 in January. Has had speech therapy due to severe glue ear, grommets etc but has been 'signed off' from SALT now. No ongoing concerns.

Just recently however, he's started making up nonsense words. It was mildy amusing at first but now it's getting more and more. DS finds it hilarious.

I mentioned it to a couple of friends recently and they said it should be discouraged. I can't recall their reasoning.

Is it a bad thing?

Just for an example, DS was 'singing' We Wish you a Merry Christmas and said "we wish you a merry pumpee"

Oh and just to add if you say "what?? What's a pumpee?" This makes it all the more hilarious to him.....

They all do it, I think. I find it annoying, but don't discourage it as such. I just encourage her to do it with her friends instead.

It's all part of language development though, and just a form of play.

Well that's what I thought but when I mentioned it to my friends (they have generally older children) they acted as if i said he likes to murder kittens

It's normal speech development, my dd still does it and she's a bit older. Your friends have probably just forgotten!

Definitely normal! It is word play just like they experiment with everything else.

Think of it like mixing paint colours or building different structure with blocks

Yep, totally normal, my DS finds it hilarious too

Yes it's play which is how children learn. He is experimenting with and learning about his language.

There's no need to discourage it or even mention it any more than you would intervene in him experimenting with water in the bath. If it becomes intrusive or unacceptable in any way address it in the same way you would bathwater splashing on the floor. Introduce some boundaries but allow him to continue in appropriate ways.

totally normal. Ds age 5 and his friends still lapse into nonsense when they are excited, and make each other hysterical by making up anything vaguely rude sounding e. I guarantee that 'pumpee' would have them rolling on the floor...

Yes, normal. My ds (5) loves making up words!

Yes, as everyone has said, normal and shows imagination I would have thought.

On a Lake District holiday, our ten yr old DS saw the sun reflecting off ripples on a lake (Crummock Water) and called them "dazzlettes" - a word we still enjoy, twenty years later!

Yes, perfectly normal HERE:

(Several views of Crummock Water HERE )

I'd say it's just exploring language, meaning and creating sounds. DS1 is 2.5 and we play a game sometime where we each just repeat a different nonsense word to each other (DH and I do it too: yipple, plipple, popple, dopple etc.). It's funny and doesn't get in the way of communicating with proper words. DS is bilingual.

Maybe we're slightly crazy though

Utterly normal, not even any need to be discouraged. Play with it, explore rhythms, rhymes, alliteration, and then extend those discoveries into real words.

My DS who is also 3 does this - I find it utterly irritating but try to just ignore it - sometimes I do say "I'm don't know what you mean, can you tell me again" but it seems to crack him up even more if I acknowledge it.

Its fun, my 6 year old still does it, as do all his freinds. Its normal just have fun with it as its not going to stop.

My DD. 2.5, does it and occasionally stumbles accidentally on a really bad swear word - cunt and fuck have both been 'made-up' words and I've struggled to keep a straight face

She sometimes uses baby language too, lots of googoos and gaagaas.

Never discouraged it (even the sweary ones) but don't encourage it either. Like others have said, it's just playing.

Yes my DS stumbled on "wank-up" as one made up word which I stifled a laugh over.

My ds (12) used to do it loads, now less so but not completely stopped. He is a very confident speaker now with a wide vocabulary. I wouldn't worry about it.

My 3 year old finds this hilarious we are forever being called 'punkipines' and 'boindoins' my 20 month old copies as well! I think it's cute

Totally normal and creative and funny.