Infant Language Development Terms

• CHILD-DIRECTED SPEECH - Also called motherese or parentese. This is the sing-song manner in which most adults automatically speak to babies. It is so attractive to infants that they would rather hear a foreign language in motherese than regular adult-directed speech in their own language. Child-directed speech is characterized by stretched vowels, simple syntax, a higher tone, and repetition. These very qualities support early language development.
• TURN TAKING - An essential skill for many activities, including conversation. Taking turns nonverbally starts shortly after birth. Babies as young as two or three months old appear to listen, use eye contact, and respond to adults. At three to six months, infant-adult “conversations” consist of babbling and then waiting for a response from the adult. “Peek-a-boo” and “patty-cake” games teach turn taking (and delight babies at this stage).
• JOINT ATTENTION - The process of sharing your focus of attention with others. Pointing, gesturing, and looking at (or eye gaze) are all ways of directing the other’s attention to the object or event of interest. Like turn taking, it is a critical skill for social and cognitive development as well as language.
• PRODUCTION - The ability to speak or produce words; also called expressive language. It always lags far behind the ability to understand in new language learners. This is true for adults, too. For example, I can understand much more Spanish than I can say.
• COMPREHENSION - Being able to understand spoken language or receptive language. Understanding words is much easier than producing them, as any adult who has learned a second language knows.
• BILINGUAL - Refers to children who learn two languages, either both simultaneously from birth or, less commonly, a second language once the first is understood. Although many people still believe that multilingualism slows language growth, research has identified many advantages to bilingualism. For example, bilingual infants can discriminate between the sounds of two languages long-term (Bosch & Sebastian-Galles, 2001). Older dual-language learners are more advanced in literacy and have better selective attention, a skill important in situations where it is necessary to filter out irrelevant information (Bialystok, 2001).
• NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION - Includes all communication aside from talking--gestures, body language, facial expression, and eye contact. At two to three months, infants can finally smile in a purposeful way--one of the first intentional nonverbal communications. Other early communications include turning away from disliked stimulation and/or clinging to a parent. At about nine months, infants can bring you things for help; at ten months or so they can point; at ten to twelve months, they can lift their arms to be picked up, wave bye-bye, clap, and dance. A lack of gesturing may be a red flag of a developmental problem.
• SIGN LANGUAGE - A specific type of nonverbal communication that employs certain gestures to represent words. Non-hearing-impaired infants are taught sign language in order to communicate with caregivers before they are able to speak. This approach first began in the 1980s. Despite fears that learning to sign would slow verbal language development, studies have found that it actually helps babies talk sooner than non-signers. Other benefits of signing include fewer tantrums, improved parent-child relationships, larger vocabularies, and long-term IQ gains (Acredolo & Goodwyn, 1999; Acredolo & Goodwyn, 2000). Additionally, children who continue learning ASL (American Sign Language) will have the same advantages that all bilingual children have.