Hellobee Boards

Wombat may only be 3 months old (today actually, which I didn't know until someone told me), but I ask her questions, pretend that she's telling me about poltics or something really advanced, and cringe when someone talks baby talk to her.

I don't think we'll do baby talk. When I was a little girl, I remember my mom getting irritated when overhearing me talk baby talk to my dolls. She said "Don't talk to babies like that, we didn't talk to you like that!"
I think it really makes sense. The kids I know that are the most verbal and precocious are the ones who's parents speak to them in age-appropriate but normal language. Why make kids learn an intermediate set of words, then expect them to learn the right way to say things later?

Oops! I didn't mean that to sound accusatory. I meant more like reinforcing intermediate words... I'm sure it's hard not to join in when they use their own little short hand!

No, we never did baby talk. I guess that it is not in our personalities rather than an overly conscious decision. I sent her to day care early and I noticed that no one did baby talk there either. So now that I think about it ... my daughter has never said the baby version of any word so I guess we did have an influence.

I don't think kids make up baby talk, they just use the sounds available to them at the developmental point in time. So "baba" is the beginning of their speech. I don't mind if they use it, but for us, it's always "yes, that's your bottle."