TALK TIP: USE PARENTESE

“Parentese” is a high-pitched, exaggerated, sing-songy speaking style.  This speaking style has been shown to get a child’s attention more than just regular speech and make learning language easier.  When using “Parentese”, your baby becomes more socially tuned in and their brain learns to parse out sounds that are clearly distinct from others.  Your baby goes from hearing a continuous stream of gibberish to understanding that each word has meaning. 

When using “Parentese”, it’s important to remember that we do not mispronounce words and reduce them to a simpler form (often what people refer to as “Baby Talk”).  For example, if your child says “wawa” for “water”, you should not repeat “wawa”.  It’s important that you say the correct pronunciation of words and use grammatically correct phrases when interacting with your child.   They need to hear the correct models to eventually say words and sentences correctly themselves.