How can I help my toddler to speak more clearly?

By eighteen months, your child probably has a pretty impressive spoken vocabulary already. In fact, aside from mama and dada, your child could already be saying more than a dozen words clearly, including bye bye, cookie, car, and other short, easy words.

You may even have noticed two or three word sentences, and that your child sometimes just mimics your conversation, getting one or two words right almost accidentally.

All of this is perfectly normal, and in fact, if your child hasn’t said at least one or two words clearly by now, then there’s a chance that there may be something amiss with his or her hearing, and you should have it tested.

Another important milestone in language development is learning to vary tone. When your child raises his or her voice when making a request (or demand as the case may be) it’s an important sign that he or she has learned that tone makes a difference. That’s an important building block for speech later on!

The best thing you can do now is to give your child plenty of positive reinforcement. If he or she asks for something, and the words don’t come out quite right, but you can make out the meaning, and then reward the effort by complying with the request. You can always repeat the word back to your child in response, but don’t try to correct your toddler – that can come later, if at all.