Leilani is making further languauge progress: Her word for food has been “Nam-Nam” for a while now, it is German babytalk, and she can say “ball”… Today on our walk I picked up a round avocado that the wind had just blown off a tree. Leilani said “ball” and I explained to her it was an avocado that we’d eat for lunch. She thought for a few seconds and then said “Namnam ball”. New words now are “Pa” for brush (don’t ask me why) and she signs washing hands (more to tell us she understood what we want than to ask for it :-) and she has made up the cutest sign for flower – she crinkles up her nose and sniffs, because many flowers smell good. She does it without really smelling when we show her a picture of a flower and ask what it is. The most important word that we are working on now – she repeats it but doesn’t use it on her own yet – is “Weh-Weh” German babytalk for pain.
I noticed (from reading “Dear Abby” and mothering.com that the nation is divided on the subject of babytalk – so I need to add my two cents too. We do use babytalk on certain words to teach her much easier words, with easier sounds. “Ei-Ei” – means pet the cat gently (or don’t hit …, instead touch gently), “Weh-weh” – pain, “night-night” – sleep, “num-num”/”Namnam” – food (basically she started saying that on her own, I think it was banana that she tried to say, one of her first solids, but now nana -banana and num-num are definitly 2 different words)… These are words that are much easier for children to master than the adult version – the German “Essen” is a very hard word, so is the english “sleep”. Most often we use both, the adult word in whichever language we are speaking, and the baby word. When she says something understandable we echo her word back to her together with the translation – the dialog goes something like “Wawa!” (translated from German->) “You are saying Wawa, Mommy is saying Wasser (Daddy is saying water) wawa – water – wasser – would you like to drink?” “Wawa” … at this point the water for her is ready too and she drinks. We also use a high pitched voice and speak much more slowly and simplified, but still try to keep the grammer correct. Even though we planned on (and are still trying to) using more sign language we are still sticking with baby talk, signing is more efford than one would expect (hands out of direct field of vision, baby is beeing carried or crawls, hands full)
It is pretty important to me that Leilani learns to communicate as soon as possible, because it will decrease her frustration, not to brag about it or as a sign of intelligence (the person I regard as the most intelligent of all at all times, Albert Einstein supposedly started talking at the age of 5 years, and I personally know a bright 7 year old boy who started talking when he was almost 4). Leilani is a very active, and a little highstrung and nervous baby, who already throws pretty bad tantrums (screaming at the top of her lungs, throwing herself on the ground, hitting back of her head to the ground…) if she doesn’t get what she wants / needs. Unfortunately sometimes these are essential things like food, water, nursing, a nap (or important non-essentials like Tylenol for teething pain) and we sometimes are too busy to read her pre-verbal early signals. My theory goes that at least 2/3 of her tantrums could be prevented as soon as she uses language consistantely – I might be wrong and maybe she will throw tantrums just for the sake of it like some other mothers imply, but I want to try.