Educating Little Ones

Children need a language-rich environment in order to develop intellectually.

Study after study has shown this. If you talk to your baby and toddler directly, even before you think they understand you fully, they will develop a winder vocabulary, both spoken and understood, earlier and, with that, they'll be able to process ideas in a more sophisticated way, as well as communicate and interact with the world better. These benefits are long-lasting, too.

It's not just about the language they overhear, or plonking them in front of the tv (I know...we all did it), it's important to stress. You might feel a bit of a twerp sitting opposite your 12 month old baby and talking about the day, or their clothes or toys, directly, or reading them books on your lap, but it's the directness and richness of the vocabulary used which is vital.

Sadly, it's children from families with lower socioeconomic status that tend to speak less often, and use fewer words, to their children. Recent research found that by the age of 2 years, English-learning children from lower-SES families were already 6 months behind same-age children from higher-SES families in vocabulary and speech processing skills that are crucial for language learning.

You can do this, Dear Daughter.

I hope that you won't get the impression that this blog is about what you *should* do, but about what you *could* do. And you could provide some linguistic nutrition for your child. :-)

If you want to read some research about this, then you can click on this link.

Mimi is a wife to Jamie, mother to two grown up children, a mother-in-law and a grandmother to a darling little grand-daughter. She home-educated her children and now teaches exam subjects to groups of home-educated children. She's a Worship Leader in her church and has a passion for helping women raise children to adulthood with a strong faith in the Lord Jesus.