What is considered a word?
This post is written by Lubaina Mohamedali, Pediatric SLP
Working within the pediatric environment, a common question I ask parents is, “How many words does your toddler know?” The response is often “not a lot” or “just a few words.” This is because parents don’t always know what counts as a word.
What is considered a word?
For starters, your little one MUST (c)onsistently, (i)ndependently, and (i)ntentionally use the word to refer to someone or something. Let’s talk about this in more detail because it’s important we ‘C’ ‘I’ to ‘I’ on this:
CONSISTENTLY (i.e. frequently and more than once)
INDEPENDENTLY (i.e. your toddler uses the word on their own, not imitating you!)
INTENTIONALLY (i.e. in the right context…associating two related concepts with each other; like ‘wee’ when going down the slide or ‘uh-oh’ when something falls)
What are the different types of words?
Word Approximations:
“muh” for “more” or “ba” for “bottle.” When a child utilizes only part of the full word, this is typical and likely to occur within the early years.
Animal Sounds:
“Oo-oo-aah-ahh,” and “Moo!,” are sounds kids love to hear when they read books or listen to songs. These all count as words. Since animal sounds are fun and easy to copy, you may have heard these amongst your child’s babbling!
Environmental Sounds:
“Choo-choo” and “vroom-vroom” count as words! If you pair the sound with a gesture (e.g. honking a horn, pulling a train chain), your little one will likely pick up the sound even faster!
Exclamatory Words:
“Uh-oh,” “wee-woo,” and “yay!” count as social words. The best part of using these words is how your face changes, which your child will probably pay close attention to.
Gestures/Sign Language:
“Milk,” “water,” “more,” or “all done,” are considered words! Remember, just like their first words don’t need to sound perfect, their signs/gestures don’t need to look perfect either!
Now that you’ve read through all the word types, you might think that many of your child’s attempts don’t sound like the actual word. Don’t forget that your child’s speech sound repertoire has not fully developed, which means their word attempts will not be accurate.
What are the facts?
Toddlers commonly say their first word around 12-15 months (Hagan et. al., 2008). If you expose your child to a second language, they may say their first words somewhat later than a child learning one language, although still within the normal range (Meisel, 2004). It is also important to remember that if your child says the same words in different languages, it counts as separate words.
Just like children learn to crawl and walk at different ages, speech sounds also come at different ages. This is because some sounds are easier for little mouths to mimic. The sounds you will often hear in the early years include: /o/, /a/, /u/, /h/, /p/, /b/, /m/, /w/, /d/, /t/, and /n/. Similarly, many of the words you hear in the early years will be a combination of these early sounds (e.g. mama, dada, baba, hi, bye, yum, ya, no)
Why is this important to count your child’s number of words?
Birth to three is when kids are going through a period of rapid brain growth. Therefore, it’s important to take advantage of how much information they absorb. Knowing what to look for not only helps you effectively track and facilitate your child’s speech and language development, but also ensures you feel confident about your child’s potential.
References:
Hoff, E., & Core, C. (2015). What clinicians need to know about bilingual development. In Seminars in speech and language (Vol. 36, No. 02, pp. 089-099). Thieme Medical Publishers.
Hagan, J., Shaw, J. S., & Duncan, P. M. (Eds.). (2008). Bright futures: Guidelines for health supervision of infants, children, and adolescents (3rd ed.). Elk Grove Village, IL: American Academy of Pediatrics.
Meisel, J. (2004). The Bilingual Child. In T. Bhatia & W. Ritchie (Eds.), The Handbook of Bilingualism. pp 91-113. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Sander, E. K. (1972). When are speech sounds learned?. Journal of speech and hearing disorders, 37(1), 55-63.