Understanding your speech

Your baby can't talk yet, but it doesn't mean he/she can't understand you!

The little one understands speech from 3 months old, listening to your voice, intonations and taking part in communication.

Remember that your reactions to the baby's early cries, coos, grunts, gurgles, smiles, and babbling teach your child the cause and effect relationship that is communicating. 

Your little guy now has the cognitive ability to understand cause-effect relationships, and he is beginning to play with this new concept to communicate. Most 6 months olds use facial expressions, eye gaze, grunts, babbles, gestures, etc to start to communicate with intent. 

Your baby may begin gesturing toward objects they want, like that funny toy or interesting things out of their reach with the intent to get you to give it to them. And another big milestone that happens around now is that your little guy will begin to initiate joint attention or joint reference with you.

Arrange various games to stimulate the baby babbling development:

• Play games with your baby e.g. peek a boo. This will help your baby to learn about give and take which is an important skill for engaging in conversation and learning a language.
• Sing songs and nursery rhymes and enjoy large picture books together
• Leave books where your baby can reach them, and allow your baby to explore them in any way he/she likes
• Talk about everyday things, hold conversations with your baby and follow his/her lead.
• Responding to your baby’s sounds is also important, since these are your baby’s first attempts at using language. Your response motivates the little one to keep trying.

Your baby's speech development depends on your communication with the little one!

Make photos with your baby, upload to the App. Write how he/she communicates with you.