typical early words for babies and toddlers in your language

[dustthouart]

From both my (admittedly introductory) study of linguistics and my own experience with my 14 month old, it seems that the early words of children are guided chiefly by #1 what the children themselves find most urgent and interesting to communicate, #2 what their unskilled and immature muscles find possible to form, and #3 starting with nouns and

Comments

[pickledginger]

First and early words in English often include Mama, Dada or Papa, baba (for bottle), wawa (for water), and similar constructions. But I have a niece who, while her mother and father were engaged in unhealthy first-word competition (say Mama, honey: ma-ma! / come on, sweetie, say Dada!), threw convention out the window and clearly exclaimed -- as she watched a kids' show.on TV during a family gathering -- "doggie!!"

[ti_ana]

"Doggie" was one of my nephew's first words as well. My brother has a French Bulldog who my nephew adores, so it was natural, I suppose!

[pickledginger]

They didn't have a dog ... yet.

[pickledginger]

:-)
My sister's family didn't have a dog at the time -- her husband doesn't like them -- but as you can imagine, that has changed.

My niece kept asking for a doggie; he kept saying she wasn't old enough. She kept asking how old was old enough; eventually, when she was I think about a year and a half old*, he told her, "when you're five." (He figured she'd forget. Hah!) So for the next three and a half years, instead of asking for a doggie, she talked about what kind of doggie she would get when she was five.

They ended up with a very well-behaved and much-beloved Yorkie.

(*Yes, she was all about being verbal, and started speaking very young.)

[ti_ana]

That's adorable! My sister-in-law was afraid of dogs her whole life, but sometime after marrying my brother (I suspect after watching Cesar Millan's Dog Whisperer show), she changed her mind and they decided to get a French Bulldog. Now she LOVES dogs. Fast forward to two years later, my nephew and the pup are best friends. It's seriously adorable how happy he gets when he sees her, even in pictures. Pets can do amazing things. :-)