Ask:
I am asking this because I've noticed lately how many people use baby talk, made up words and all sorts of gibberish when talking to small children, especially babies.
Some good friends of ours just had a baby in Dec. and they (and many of their other friends) are very bad about this. They never use their real voices and it makes me crazy. Although they look at me like I'm crazy for using normal language.
My mil still does this with my 3 year old neice! Maybe its just the pregnancy hormones but I can't stand it. I will admit I use a softer version of my regular voice but its still my voice and still words I would use in any conversation. I can just feel a war coming when this baby is born. I guess it won't matter too much b/c the baby won't be with them a lot, and we'll still do it my way at home. (I should say our way as dh agrees).
I just wanted to see what everyone else does/thinks.
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I just wanted to add that I think the way I do because children learn from us. They are developing speech and understanding and how are they to ever develop if they don't hear it from you?
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I don't and pretty much insisted/demand that everyone else in contact with the boys didn't/don't now either. I think it's cute, but has NO educational value.
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I hate baby talk!!! So, no, I don't use it.
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No we do not! My husband did with his first (my 2nd) and omg it drove me nuts! She did not talk any where as good as my older daughter. When my husband left for military training she was not baby talked. When he came home he was so surprised at how well she talked. He said what did you do? I said there was no baby talk. 2 daughters later still no baby talk from him
My SIL babytalks AJ and he is 2 in June and does not talk. It drives me bonkers!
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I will change my tone or accent to eleicit a smile or laugh but I will not change the word its self. I never did it with my own kids and they had very little trouble pronouncing words when they started speaking.
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Thinking back... hmmm... nope.. don't think I ever did. And it drives me insane when people do to older kids especially.. lol! With a baby or 1-2 yr. old and they're just doing it once in a while, sure.. but to older kids!? Come on.. lol!!
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I can't stand baby talk! One of the boys I watch is 4 and his parents still say "do want some milky" I have started to finaly correct all of them. The parents also will say dumb things like its my turn to pick up the baby...Drives me INSANE!
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I'm so glad to see that I'm not alone in this. What really got me thinking is when my mil did it to the 3 year old and I wanted to smack them both. She had just gotten in trouble and of course my MIL cradles her and says "what's wrong with you?" but if you weren't listening closely you couldn't tell that's what she said b/c it was all baby talk. (of course that will be a whole other fight)
Answer:
I don't believe in using baby talk with babies and children. I do believe in using shorter age appropriate sentences (dropping some adjectives and verbs). She used some of her own creative substitutes for words. I never corrected her at a young age (1-2) but did use the correct word in a sentence afterwards. The only baby talk word we used was "Nin Nin" for when she wanted to nurse. She was then able to tell me from 6 months when she wanted to nurse.
When my little one started to talk I would encourage her to speak in short age appropriate sentences.
She said "Cat" I would say "Yes you saw A CAT"
When she started saying "A cat" I would say the same and start adding adjectives and verbs to her sentences. By 2 she was speaking better than most 3 year olds.
Jen