Here’s your “coming to Jesus” for the day…
Are you one of those parent’s who has tried to convince others that your infant can talk?
I love when people do this — “I swear, he said ‘hungry’ the other day, and it was his feeding time!” Really? You’re telling me that your 4-month-old not only articulated the word “hungry”, but that he also knew the meaning of it?
It’s absolutely conceivable that babies can repeat sounds, and you might even get lucky and hear them repeat a series of sounds, but– and I say this without having done extensive research on the topic — I have a very hard time believing that an infant can know the meaning of words well enough to pick them out of their “vocabulary” and say them at an appropriate time. Someone please show me the evidence otherwise, because I’d be happy to learn.
I gathered several YouTube videos for your pleasure. These parents were all convinced that their children were little talking baby Einsteins. You be the judge!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU7X5X-wu54&w=420&h=315]
I hear the “I” sound here, but that’s about it. I’m sure he is watching her mouth and trying to replicate it. Not only that, he is enjoying the “conversation” and interaction between the two of them. It’s cute, but I can’t say I buy into the idea that he is saying, “I love you.”
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obtS5HP4Ii4&w=420&h=315]
This baby does a pretty good job at the end, but my attention was completely diverted by the fact that the man in the video was saying, “I WUV you” over-and-over, so here I go on a caveat. One way to surely set our little sponges of children up for vocab failure is to mispronounce words. They have a hard enough time finding the right tongue and lip placement to say things correctly. The last thing they need is to learn how to say things the baby way first and the adult way later. Do your baby a favor and give them the correct pronunciation from the get-go!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4_JLvGcRuk&w=420&h=315]
Gracie actually says “I love you” pretty well. This shows you the power of repetition and that her tongue-eye coordination is on-point. Of course, she has no way to conceive the meaning of the words, but she does a great job repeating them.
…and my favorite video shows the power of communication and community at any age! Precious!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JmA2ClUvUY&w=560&h=315]
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