Baby Talk: How to Talk to Your Baby in a Nurturing Way

Babies learn language and speech through a relationship with their caregiver. That is why it’s important to know how to talk to your baby.

This doesn’t mean baby talk, it means talking to your baby in a way that is sure to get his attention. Here are some hints on how:

The following is provided by Registered Speech-Language Pathologist Carmen Hengeveld fromTotspeech

What does it sound like? POSITIVE not gruff

• High pitched
• Animated (up and down inflection)
• Short phrases/words but are not ‘baby talk’
• Repeated key words
• Long pauses between phrases
• Gentle voice and not yelling

What does it look like? LOVING not teasing or mean

• Baby and adult look at each other a lot
• Adult imitates baby’s sounds and gestures
• Adult uses many gestures and facial expressions
• Adult and baby take turns
• Adult smiles a lot
• Adult is very attentive to baby

What does it feel like? SAFE not scary

• Adult says what the baby might say if the baby could talk
• Adult reads baby’s messages and respects baby’s wants and needs
• Adult is kind, gentle, encouraging, warm, loving, and enthusiastic
• Adult never purposely startles or scares baby
• Adult talks about baby’s emotions with sympathy

Taken from: 

http://www.tvo.org/cfmx/tvoorg/tvoparents/index.cfm?page_id=145&action=article&article_title_url=BabyTalkHowtoTalktoYourBabyinaNurturingWay&article_id=6263