Is your baby 24 months old or 31 months old?

[sundaymorningstaple]

For me, it's all academic. My way worked excellently. In fact, they went to local schools, they are fluent in English (albeit American), Mandarin, Singlish and understand Tamil as well, although they don't actually use the language, they were also exposed to it from birth on a daily basis.

What ever works for you is okay with me. At 64 I'm not about to have another family just to try it a different way to find out.

[nakatago]

For me, it's all academic. My way worked excellently. In fact, they went to local schools, they are fluent in English (albeit American)

I'm curious; how did you enforce using the accent? Sure, you could control how people talked to your children but they'd tend to assimilate stuff once in school.

[gravida]

For me, it's all academic. My way worked excellently.

Of course it is academic, norms are academic, that is why at least till two years of age everyone is taking the developmental norms with a pinch of salt, as there are tons of individual differences. That is also why "your way" worked excellently with your children, but you know what? I can assure you that you will not be able (no matter how much effort you would put in) to do the same with my kid. And most likely with thousands of other children. That is also why parents who have more than one child* always repeat how differently the siblings develop, even identical twins.

*BTW, you have also son, right? Did he talk in sentences at 7.5 months? No, you have written it was a month later. So what had happened? You have done the same thing, even more - you were more experienced, you knew it worked so well with your daughter, so why oh why your son spoke so well "only at" 8.5 months?

[sundaymorningstaple]

With three children, we busted the so called "norms" by 50% or better, and that was two+ decades ago. As far as the 2nd being a month later? Maybe we didn't take as many bus rides? Who knows. But, with two of our own and a relative who didn't follow it as closely I kind of like my anecdotal evidence better than some unknown theory on the internet. Obviously there is a margin of variance or we would all be iRobot wouldn't we.

There is no right way to bringing them up and teaching them. It's what ever works for you. And them.

[gravida]

It's what ever works for you. And them.

In my case I would rather highlight "and them" part. My boy doesn't fit into any regular norms/milestones etc. He got his first tooth at 4 months of age; he was crawling before he was able to sit independently; he picked up crawling, sitting, lifting up to standing and cruising all within the same month (usually children need few months to achieve all of that); he is playing in a different way than other kids; when he was younger I non stop heard comments how serious child he is (including our paediatrician); he is completely not interested in pleasing adults and receiving social reinforcements; he is literally laughing when we are trying "the old tricks" that usually work with kids... I could go on with the list. What I would like to do or to teach him, the way I wish to stimulate him, that is a separate thing. HIS way is all that matters and frankly, that is the way it suppose to be. He is an individual, which is great. It is simply harder to figure out sometimes how to get him to follow some of the things he has to learn (like "do not touch this", "no climbing" etc.), as he is definitely not responding to the methods my siblings used with their children, or tricks mentioned in the books

[Mary Hatch Bailey]

gravida,

OK, and all well & good. But really - does it matter? Kids are different, parents are different, and as said, there is a wide range of 'normal.' Your posts bring up an interesting, different perspective but I can't help thinking when I read them that you assume SMS and I ascribe only to 'nurture' and give any no credence to the 'nature'? I can't speak for SMS, but I believe the nature/nurture duality occurs in all children. In my opinion, for something like speech development, the two are never mutually exclusive.

[gravida]

Everybody thought my daughter was a genius as she started talking in sentences at 7.5 months. Eveybody wanted to know how. The answer was so simple I lost a lot of respect for the "education" here. I just refused to let anybody talk to my kids in baby talk. Full Stop.

and

My kids are all extremely verbal; always tested off the charts because I imbued their lives with language at every opportunity. I read to them ad nauseum, I talked to them, I called everything by its right and proper name. Of all the things I screwed up as a parent, that's not one of them.

Hmmm, I do not know about other readers, but to me it sounds: "come on, it is SO EASY, just talk to your children using proper language, talk a lot." None of you (excluding your last post) mentioned that there could be something more than your active involvement behind the "success".

[Mary Hatch Bailey]

Easy?


Easy???

Sheesh! No!

Parenting is the hardest job there is, case closed.


There are implied arguments ~ I never said I fed them well and made sure they got enough sleep or kept them out of the way of migrating wildebeests. That's assumed. I think you made a bit of a leap there, but apologize if I came off cavalier.

It's important to remember too ~ All that time I spent reading to my brood, we weren't going over those math flashcards one more time, or we opted not to play another 30 minutes at the playground or we skipped bath time. Life is all about choices, I made mine. But there are always consequences.

[sundaymorningstaple]

gravida,

I'm not sure what you are driving at, but it seems like you think we are attacking you & your methods. As far as there being more than one's active involvement, I don't know. The only thing I know is what the results of my "experiemnt" produced. Not only with my children but with others who also tried to emulate the time spent and the limitation of external interference (e.g., bad English/baby talk, etc) with less success (they didn't live in my household and therefore were subject to slightly different stimuli). Same with my 2nd. There is also different stimuli present 5 years later as well. Circumstances change, both parents working, etc. etc.. But in 3 tries, we beat the supposed "norms" by 50% or better. To me that says something. I'm no genius and neither is my spouse, but children learn by imitation. If you remove the wrong stimuli, your chances are much better of beating the norms. Far as I'm concerned, that's as far as it goes.

I'm not challenging the experts, but they are considered experts by whom? Certainly not me as I know the results may vary considerably. I've already proved it over 20 years ago. YIRMV

[x9200]

SMS, frankly, you even don't know if the speech achievements of your kids were the results of your approach. Who knows, if you have done nothing or have been bubbling to them maybe they still started to talk at that age or only a bit later? 3 cases in total and 2/3 of it within your gene pool. Lets be modest, this is really not such unique idea nobody had it before so if this would be so effective, not 50% but "only" in 20%, why hardly anybody uses it? Why the professionals do not emphasize on using such approach? Clearly it must not be that universally effective leaving aside some conspiracy theories.

[sundaymorningstaple]

Or it could be parents cannot devote as much time to ensuring the external detrimental stimuli are kept to a minimum. (e.g., domestic help for instance) Who knows? As I said, I know the bloodline on either side of the family are not mensa qualified! Especially, yours truly!

Also, how do we know how many do it my way? Just because they are not part of a larger study, or have a control group, doesn't mean we are fewer in number. Maybe we are just doing what seems logical, at least to me. Stands to reason if babies learn by imitation, then if you can control that which they observe, you are half the way there. Again, I personally have nothing against anybody's method of raise their babies. I frankly don't care. I was just reiterating how we raised ours and the time line for speech. Your mileage may vary.

[QRM]

Dont know if this counts but I used hand sign language with my sprog way before she could talk, very simple ones for food, nappy, sleep, pain, fun, etc and worked a treat. Very few tantrums because she could get the message across. She still occasionally does them from across the room.

[JR8]

Hehehe QRM wins this round of Mummy-Wars

[sundaymorningstaple]

Yep, validated what I've been saying all along. Children will learn to communicate earlier if you give them the right clues. But to me googoo gaagaa isn't really a clue. Be it learning signing or the pronunciation of words.

[poodlek]

Veering slightly off topic here, I have noticed that folks here tend to have pretty low expectations of babies. Most locals I encountered when C was a newborn were astounded at the way he looked at things and held a person's gaze, as I had several people tell me "babies are born blind" and shouldn't be able to see anything. So if you expect little, that's probably what you'll get, especially if you don't bother interacting with the child because it is supposedly blind and ignorant of everything until whatever age.