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Now that all the lists are out–Parents Magazine, Parenting, Toywishes, Amazon and others–for the best new toys for holiday giving, parents are asking what to buy? All these lists are helpful but what I have assembled is a list of my favorite toys, many new but some old favorites, based on their value in building speech and language skills. I’ve added tips to build language to increase the educational value of the toy.
There is a huge push to read to your baby as soon as she is born–and even before since her auditory system is mature after the second trimester. Research shows that the amount of talking to your baby positively influences her language development. The more words your baby hears, the better it is for her language growth. Babies are hard-wired to learn language but the quantity of words you feed your baby is important. In the same way that it’s critical to narrate your day to your infant, filling her day with words, reading to your baby offers many of the same advantages. Your infant is hearing the “rhythm of language”, distinguishing her primary language from other languages based on timing, pitch and sounds. An article in a recent parenting magazine suggests that if you have an infant to 3 month old it is best to choose books that have one word on a page.
Not so for language development! The first three months are an opportunity to bathe your child in all kinds of language, through conversation as well as reading books. Try nursery rhymes, poems, stories or picture books. You have a little window when your infant will happily listen to anything. Around 3 months, she will be more attentive to a shorter text with all the rhyme and rhythm of Brown Bear Brown Bear or Moo Baa La La La ,
When visiting new Mom, Dad, and 2 week-old Caroline, I noticed Favorite Nursery Rhymes from Mother Goose, Classic Fairy Tales and Talking Like the Rain: A Read-to-me Book of Poems in. the nursery. Mom had researched these beautiful anthologies, bought them and was reading them to her daughter. Caroline was hearing the bouncy beat and rhyme of “Jack and Jill went up the hill,” the flowing language of classic fairy tales like “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” and the shorter rhyming phrases of poems by endearing authors. Another mom read the Madeleine series to her newborn daughter who happened to be named Madeleine.
As your infant gets older and more discerning for a bright, simple, shorter rhythmic rhyming tale, she might not have the patience for a longer story. This can happen around 3 months but don’t hesitate to keep reading longer, more complex stories to your child as long as she is interested.
