Children Language.. How to understand it

Anyone is proud of his national language as it represents the nation and people he belongs to. An Arab Moslem is proud of the Arabic language because, in addition to that it is the language of the nation and people he belongs to, it is the language of his religion, the Islam, which is the most sublime thing a Moslem may feel pride of.

Allah praises our language, the Arabic language, in the holy Koran when He says: “ We have put forth for men, in this Koran every kind of Parable, in order that they may receive admonition. It is a Koran in Arabic without any crookedness in order that they may guard against Evil” ( Surah Al Zumar, 27-28)

Linguistic development of a child

Sounds are typically the raw material of a language. During the early months of a child life, crying, shouting and screaming constitute his way to express himself and his condition. It is very important during that period that mother should carefully monitor her baby and continue to communicate with him by talking to him, particularly while feeding him.

Scientific researches and studies indicate that a mother recognizes the kinds and causes of her child cries and knows whether he cries out of hunger or because of pain.

It is essential during such period that mother should:

Talk tenderly to her baby while lulling and caressing him, and try to repeat certain sound units before him.
Not to rush his pronouncing of clear letters or words as the sound units pronounced by a baby have nothing to do with growth.
Not to stop a baby from playing or otherwise making any noise with the excuse that he bothers or disturbs others, because playing is in effect a good training of the baby on practicing and using his vocal system.

When does a child pronounce the first word?

All psychologists hold that the eleventh and twelfth months of the first year constitute the candidate period for a normal child to start pronouncing. However, we often notice how some parents rush pronouncing of their child. In fact, this is wrong and far from reality, as the vocal members should have already been sufficiently grown and developed so that pronouncing may be expected. Pronouncing may be delayed until a child become fifteen months’ old. Education specialists, therefore recommend the following, particularly during the last two months of the first year:

Train the senses of the baby on hearing and listening, such as listening to Koran recitation at a soft sound.
Call the baby by his name and communicate to him the love and tenderness feelings.
Feed the baby at quite and comfortable place while caressing him and tenderly touching his toe and hair.
Frequently lull and caress the baby as researches indicated that a baby deprived from lulling and caressing becomes nervous and bad-tempered and tending to isolation, hostility and spite.

Development of the child vocabulary in the second year

The vocabulary of a child rapidly develop in his second year to include important conceptions, and he starts:

Responding to questions and orders.
Using words and realizing their meanings.

A child repeatedly uses about 20 words during his second year. However, there are distinct differences among children in this respect.

Names prevail over any other words used in this age phase, and a child may typically compose words together into simple phrases or sentences.

During this phase, parents should:

1- Stimulate the linguistic abilities of their child by:

Frequently talking to him e.g. in the form of questions and dialogues.
Tenderly motivating him to speak.
Displaying various environment stimulants to recognize them.

2- Take the individual differences among children into consideration. No pressure should be made on a child to pronounce words pronounced by another child. He should never be punished if he does not do as required, otherwise his linguistic development would be impaired.

It is noticed that female children surpass male ones in the linguistic aspects, as girls typically speak earlier than boys and use more vocabulary than boys.

Social differences also have an important effect on how fast a child pronounce. Low-standard social class children reach higher linguistic levels because of the wider-range and more diversified linguistic stimulants they receive in their environment.

Linguistic Development after the Second Year

Child’s ability to understand abstracts and moral matters somewhat develops, and he begins using words indicating place (such as: here, there, above, under). Therefore, parents should:

Attentively listen to their child when he expresses and describes a certain event or thing.
Give him adequate care and attention so that he can expresses himself and properly grows up.
Never try to make him think and act as adults.
Never disproof him or accuse him of lying when he has a different view than the adults. He does not mean lying,
Properly treat any disorders noticed in his speaking ability, such as trouble in expressing himself that makes him unnecessarily repeat same words, which is a phenomenon contradicting the presumed increase in his vocabulary.
Never try to make him learn bilingual vocabulary in this stage of his age. Psychological researches indicate that his abilities do not allow this.
Not to worry about the common mistakes in the words and phrases he uses. Such mistakes will automatically disappear as he grows up and acquire more experience.