Speech Development in Babies
Speech Development in Babies
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Speech Development in Babies
Communication, by definition, is the utilization of messages to generate meanings across and within different cultures, contexts, media and methods. Communication is an activity that is learned first. It is a requirement that one learns to speak his native language, operating a mobile phone and even make the use of gestures that are commonly used in his culture. The speaker must also be capable of receiving and interpreting messages from other people. Communication encompasses the use of talking, writing, non-verbal communication like traffic signals, emotions, and facial expressions, and visual communications like pictures and movies while portraying a message. Communication helps a person to express himself and therefore it is a very crucial facet of a human being’s life (Dryden & Vos, 1999). If the communication fails, a person may end up losing very many opportunities that are heading to his way. Success is also facilitated by communication. If a person has great skills in communication, he can be able to achieve almost anything that he desires or get out of all kinds of problems that may face him, no matter how complicated they are.Since the communication is learned, it starts even before the child is born, when he is in the womb. After they are born, they exhibit some of the fascinating things, and one of them is trying to learn how to talk. In a short period after their birth most children, if not all undergo a transition and transform their communication from crying to gurgling attempting to provide an explanation of what they are interested in and what they are not. Communication of the baby evolves from the gibberish first words to a pre-scholar, to elementary or middle school until the communication is well defined, and the baby can engage in detailed conversations then. The evolution of the early language constitutes the events of the parent’s or caregiver’s life that are very momentous (Shaffer & Kipp, 2014).I carried out my observation on the babies who are from the English accent as they learn to speak. Similar to other babies, their learning of communication is at first problematic. I had a conversation with a two-year-old baby, and I noticed that there are several stages of learning how to communicate effectively. For most of the children I engaged into a conversation with, learning how to talk was at the stage of difficulty and struggle, though it seems to be easy. For the children to learn how to talk more quickly and easily, the parents or the adults who keep their company at home should talk to the children for many of the time they are together. The children whose parents don’t talk much have more difficulty to develop their speech (Darity, 2008).The ability to learn how to talk is in every child since learning how to talk are a habit that is natural, and a gift that is naturally inscribed within the deepest genetic inheritance of mankind. The child utters his first words in approximately one year after he is born or two years after he is conceived. The skills and swiftness with which most of the children gain the mastery of the art of talking has left many adults fascinated. Before the child gains the coordination of the hands to be able to break a toy, he will have the utmost gained the understanding several of the sentences that the adult addresses to him, if not all (Sorrentino & Remmert, 2012). By the time they get the know-how of tying up or knotting their shoelaces, the children will have grasped the art of speaking the language of their nativity. This special capability of mastering a language so quickly can only be explained to be a gift.When sound comes out of the mouth and gain shape and lead to the formation of words is referred to as speech. The procedure of learning the way to talk has some complexity, and in order to produce speech or talk, several aspects must be there. There must be the presence of the desire for communication, the brain of the speaker must have heard words or learned them earlier in other contexts. There is the importance that the brain develops or creates the idea to communicate. The idea that the brain generates is sent to the mouth. The mouth receives signals from the brain on the words that it should mention and the sound which results to the words involved. There must also be the incorporation of accented patterns and syllables of intonation. The brain is responsible for the sending of essential signals to the muscles responsible for the production of speech. These muscles include the muscles that control the tongue, the lips, and the jaw. There must be enough coordination and strength in the muscles to perform the commands that are sent from the brain. The lungs must have enough air, and the chest muscles are supposed to be robust for the compulsion of the vocal cords and make them vibrate (Levine & Munsch, 2011). To ensure that there is functional speech, the air is supposed to be going out but not going in. Lastly, the vocal cords must be in a mint and fit condition to let out loud and clear speech. When a child produces speech, the words he speaks should be monitored by the child’s sense of hearing. The child will then be able to review the words that are said and listen to more new words for the purpose of imitation. If the child does not hear the words clearly, he will reproduce a mumbled speech (Feldman, 2014).An older person or a parent must have the inclination to connect or communicate with the child and listen attentively to the words he says. The child may lose the motivation to talk if there is no one who is listening. If the stimulation occurs appropriately, the learning process of talking takes place naturally.There are the basic stages of how a child learns how to talk. The process of a child in learning how to talk starts at birth and is innate. This starts when a child perceives sounds and voices. All children have their talking abilities beginning at birth (Mijolla & Thomson Gale, 2005). All children learn the language in the same manner regardless of the language that is spoken by a parent. The stages are well defined from 0 to 3 months, 3 to 6 months, 6 to 9 months, 9 to 12 months, 12 to 18 months, 18 to 2 years, 2-3 years, 4-5 years, 5-7 years and 7 years till adolescence(Feldman, 2014). At the stage of 0 to 3 months, the baby just coos, and he starts to make prolonged words that have changes in annotation, for instance, (“Ahh-ah-ahh”). At the stage of 3 to 6 months, the baby bables by the use of a vowel, consonant, and syllables which also have annotation variations, for instance, (“Ba-ba-ba-baa-ba!”). At the stage of 6 to 9 months, the baby can comprehend simple and short words like No! He still babbles but he can control his babbling to two syllables. The syllables may sound Ma-ma although he can’t comprehend the meaning. In the babbling, he adds the more sounds and mostly they are syllables such as da, ma, pa, ka, ba, and wa. The baby is also able to utter other typical syllables like “Ga-ma-ga” (Rathus, 2013)When a child is in the age between 9 and 12 months, the child finds bubbling funny and also the imitation of simple words. A child is then capable of understanding what some words represent, mostly the words that represent objects. The speech of the child at this stage is not meaningful yet though he tries talking at times and at other times he jabbers loudly. The baby may also make some typical utterances like “Oooooh” or “Ah-Ah” “Buh-Buh”. When the baby is in the age of 12 to 18 months, he is capable of comprehending approximately 50 to 70 words. He can also use 3 to 20 words although he won’t produce them clearly. As the baby tries to express himself, he babbles some words that don’t make sense as he points at what he means (Machado, 2007). The baby can also pronounce short words like “no!” “Mamma” “Appu” to mean apple. Between 18 months and two years of age, the baby is capable of comprehending approximately 300 words and can use up to 50 words that are recognizable. Most of the recognizable words he uses are nouns. Though he can talk using real words more often, he still babbles and uses some jargons. The language that the baby uses is for the purpose of getting his needs fulfilled. The baby says, “I want” when he aims at getting something, he also uses “uh-oh” for exclamation and uses “no!” to protest. The baby will also make the use of a rising intonation in pattern to symbolize a question and is capable of joining two or more words that are related to form one word. He can give an answer to questions like “what is your name”. The baby also joins in rhymes and pre-school songs. The speech he makes is somehow halting and choppy since he pauses so much in between the words (Windell, 2012).Between the ages of 2 to 3 years, the child can comprehend approximately 900 words and make use of 500 out those he can comprehend although his speech lacks clarity. At the age of 4 to 5 years, the child is able to understand approximately 2500 to 2800 words and make use of 1500 and more words of those he comprehends (Cort, Erikson, Apsell, Lithgow, Boysen, Dahl, Nilsson, Films Media Group, 2007). At this stage, 75 to 85 percent of his conversation is clear and uses language to describe past events and reminisce. The child at this stage uses many irregular verbs and all pronouns. He is also able to repeat sentences that are composed of 8 to 10 syllables and also attends and listens to conversations where there are movies or short stories. After this stage to 7 years or more, the child refines the language and then gains total clarity in his speech till adolescence (Levine & Munsch, 2011).
References
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