Week 3 Post 2

I thought it was really interesting to learn how newborns prefer hearing speech rather than any other sound.  I think it is neat that infants watch the mouth of the person speaking to learn how language works.  By lip-reading babies that are about five to six months old can tell whether a person is talking in their native language or not.  Another thing that is interesting to think about is how adult communicate to infants.  The interaction that an adult and a baby have is way different than when an adult speaks to another adult.  When a mother talks to her baby she often uses higher pitched sounds with simple words followed by a lot of repetition of those words.  These characteristics of speech that a mother uses with her infant are known as “motherese” or child-directed speech.  The neat thing about child-directed speech is that it is the best way to communicate with an infant therefore it is universal.  Though the infant is not saying anything back they use their sounds like squealing, growling, or cooing to communicate back to the adult.  This shows that babies are both good listeners and good communicators even at a young age.  When adults talk to infants, the more repetition of words they use the better the infant will learn and understand what the word is.  Though an infant still cannot talk, their babbling contains repeated syllables when they are between the ages of six and nine.  Then when an infant finally turns one year old they are then able to form their first words.  These first words will then lead to two word sentences.  As infants grow up they will continue to extend their vocabulary to enhance their communication.