At what age did your LO have their language explosion? And what did it look like? I keep thinking it will happen but it hasn't yet, I don't think! LO is 18.5 months old and has a ton of words (80-90 at last count) but he has been learning them gradually since about 11 months. And a lot of his words still sound the same (bah for ball, banana, book, etc). He will try to repeat most things I tell him, but can only make a similar sounds, not say the whole word. I guess I always thought of the language explosion as the point at which he would start learning like 5 new words a day and I would be able to understand everything! 
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I was just wondering about this! Sadie's definitely repeating more and more recently, but hasn't "exploded." Wondering when that will happen. I'll be following!
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I have been wondering this as well. LO only has about 10 words she routinely uses right now at 17 months...
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I'd have to go back and check but it was around 18-19 months for Charlie. He went from 100 words one month to 200 the next and it just took off from there.
Olive's was definitely more gradual and later.
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@hilsy85: 80-90! That is a lot for 18.5 months. R is almost 14 months says like 10, maybe. She says them once and not again.
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19 months was a huge explosion for us. After that it was kind of just exponential!
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@Mrs. Bee: @T-Mom: so sounds like it could be soon
@Smurfette: yeah he has a ton but they all are mostly the beginnings of the word, and all sound similar lol
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I think around 21 months for us, then again around his second birthday.
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Around 18 months, she's now 20 months and she keeps learning several words a week.
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@Smurfette: L has like... none. He makes animal sounds and says Dada. And babbles all day in nonsense words.
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We have never had an explosion. 23 months.
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19-20 months has been a huge language explosion for us. It seems that his words are getting more specific at this age. Our peds told us that he should have a 100 words by his second birthday. He's well on his way. Right now, we're waiting on him to get his "S" sound down. He calls bus "baa."
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@travellingbee: She says Mama and Dada but otherwise we were grunting and babbles. Day care said she say No no mine but I haven't heard it. I can't even get her to say bye when I leave her. Or to her classmates when I pick her up. Like she is mute when with us.
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@cascademom: bus is the ONLY word that he says correctly! With the s and everything! So funny.
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Oops, I accidentally voted wrong.
She was a late talker - I don't think it was until she turned 25 months old that she *really* started talking. I was so worried! :T It was like one day, she went from only saying one or two word sentences to five word sentences. Her vocabulary also exploded. She was learning like 20 words a day. Her receptive language has always been exceptional... she understood everything we said from a very young age, but just could never say anything herself.
She's now 26 months and is SO chatty. She can also sing, say more complicated sentences, etc. So don't worry too much!
Plenty of kids start talking late! -
@hilsy85: haha! My LO just can't seem to get the S right but he can say "Beep" "Vroom" and "quiche" perfectly. Weird.
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We're at 17 months and just have maybe 12? I need fill in my list...She uses her few words to great effect - it all depends on the context! ("all done" means stop doing what you're doing, I want to stop what I'm doing, I want out of my chair, I want to play, I want to stop playing, I don't want my diaper changed, etc.
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About 23 months
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16-17 months - My DS went from 10 words to 100 in what seemed like overnight! He got one word and the rest just started flowing!!!
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It was just around the 2 year mark, but I should also say that he began daycare at that time and wow, just wow, at the new things he started saying.
I kept waiting for an explosion at 18 months and it never really came, to be honest.
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When do you guys consider a language explosion to be?
Chloe could say a few words at 12 months, and could string very simple sentences ("I want!") by 18. Her vocabulary really picked up at 22/23 months, and she's speaking in full sentences for awhile now (30 months). I think preschool played a huge role in this!
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I don't think he's had an explosion yet. He talks in 2 or 3 word sentences. He just moved up to early preschool and they are all older than 2 and have TONS more words than LO.
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20 months!
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@Mrs. Jump Rope: I guess the point at which you feel like she was constantly increasing her vocab, and her words became easier to understand by strangers.
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Interesting that some kids never had one but if they did, it was noticeable!
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No explosion yet here. He adds words here an there but it's very gradual for the mist part. He is 20 months next week.
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I don't know if we have hit it yet because I feel like at been little "explosions" here and there rather than this one large one everyone references...
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@hilsy85: ah, okay! Well, recently then! Maybe Christmas time. She would have been 26 months!
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I think we're in the midst of an explosion - my 19mo has about 170 words, most from the past month or two. They tend to come in categories. Vehicles probably account for 50% of them! His primary form of entertainment is staring out the window of our busy street so my MIL bought him a book on "things that go" and he's picked up a lot: car, police car, convertible, ambulance, Jeep, tractor, truck, delivery truck, garbage truck, firetruck, tow truck, airplane, helicopter, cruise ship, school bus, taxi..... Some are better enunciated than others, like taxi is pretty clear but police car sounds like "puh-ee-ka" and it took us a while to understand what he was saying (we were like, "peacock?").
When I unload the dishwasher I hold up each thing and name it, and he started saying fork, spoon, knife, plate and bowl all around the same time ("fork" sounds like the f-word though ;-)) Same with animals, colors and foods.
We just had a doc appt and our ped said the goal is 50 words by age 2 so it seems like there's an huge range of normal.
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Around 18 months it started he probably only had 50 words and now at almost 24 months he has hundreds and has 2-3 word sentences.
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@hummusgirl: ha same here--vehicle/transportation words are a huge percentage of his words--he can say backhoe digger (sounds like baca dig dig) but won't say other simpler words. So funny.
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Emme had hers at 17 months and kind of stalled, I started to get worried, but at 19 months she's back at it again. She surprises me every day. I do think she's losing some of her "clearness" as she learns more words, very similar sounding but it's adorable.
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Both kids started speaking and learning new words very quickly at 15 months.
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@hilsy85: LOL, could anything be *less* useful for NYC kids than backhoe diggers and trackors?! There's a "touch a truck" event in a few weeks that we're planning to attend - I never understood the concept or why it would be a draw for kids until the last few months!
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This thread is really helpful! LO is 15 months and just started actually mimicking (occasionally) and answering questions (just one question...what is this? -> cow...or moo). He's gone from 3-4 words to close to 10 in the last couple of weeks. But in general his expressive language is very, very slow.
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@hilsy85: whoa! 80 words! DS has like 10 but his ped said that was completely normal for his age. He is starting to pick up more and more words. He'll sometimes only say a word once or twice and I never hear him say it again. I'm curious when he'll start really picking up words.
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We're still waiting at 22 months.
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I'd say around 22 months. It seems a lot of hellobee toddlers hit it around the 18/19 month mark, so I was expecting it then, but it took a while longer. Now I'm surprised daily about what he says and retains.
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@hummusgirl: oooh will have to look that up! I think if L could touch a real fire truck, his head might explode from excitement
@mrskc: yup our pedi said 10 is totally normal at this age, she was impressed with his vocab! He also sometimes will say something and then not repeat it for a while.
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Umm, my stubborn child is 22 months and still no language explosion. She has a language entirely of her own devising, it's just not intelligible to us. She seems to have no interest in saying 'real' words, although when the mood strikes her, she will bust out words for items we had no idea she knew (harmonica?! She'd seen a harmonica once, weeks earlier, and remembered its name and was able to say it pretty clearly, just once though) but for the most part, still no proper words on a consistent basis other than 'boo' and 'mama'. Our GP isn't worried and thinks it is more her personality than a problem, that's my gut feeling too, but I will say, reading all these posts does sometimes make me worry a bit....
@Smurfette: yeah he has a ton but they all are mostly the beginnings of the word, and all sound similar lol
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