Talking doesn’t start with the first ‘mama’ or ‘dada’ your child utters but from the moment they’re born.

The first step is learning to distinguish sounds – a baby can tell his mother’s voice from others by the time he’s just a week old. By two months, he’s cooing, by three months he’s focusing on you when you talk to him, and by four to six months he’s practically having a conversation with you, even if it is in babble-speak.

All of these may seem like little more than cute little moments, but they’re actually milestones in your tot’s speech development. It’s now recognised how vital the years from birth to three are in terms of how your child learns to talk and communicate, and how they develop as they get older. Assuming that they’ll pick it up at nursery or even school, is leaving it too late.

So how can you help to get your toddler talking?

• Keep talking to him. Your toddler may not say much yet, but he understands what you’re saying. Talking starts with listening so the more you talk to him, the faster he’ll learn to talk himself. Talk about what you’re doing all the time, and state the obvious, for example, ‘We’re going up to have a bath now, then get you into your pyjamas and ready for a story. We could read the lovely book grandma bought you. Look, here it is on the blue bookshelf’.
• Words and music. Get your toddler talking by reading to him every day. This will get him used to books and the words on the pages. Little kids love singing and don’t care if you’re tone deaf, so play nursery rhyme tapes and sing along with them together – they’re a brilliant way of getting kids to learn and remember words.
• Speak directly to your child and listen to him attentively without trying to finish off his sentences for him.
• Even if you don’t understand exactly what he’s saying, the chances are his body language or facial expressions will give the game away, so talk to him as if you do, ‘Have you had enough of the bricks? Do you want to play with the trains instead?’.

Spoken moments

Language development can vary widely from child to child, but here are some of the key stages:

• By one year, you toddler will understand what you’re saying and may have a couple of words to say himself.
• By 15 months he’ll have up to 10 words and will understand a simple command like ‘Get the ball’.
• By 18 months, he’ll know the names of the most important people in his life and will be able to follow more complex commands, ‘Pick up the ball and give it to daddy’.
• By 24 months, he’ll have up to 100 words in his vocabulary and will be able to form simple sentences, ‘Get ball’, ‘Mummy come’, and say ‘no’ and ‘mine’ a lot.
• By three years, he’ll have about 300 words and will be able to have a conversation of a few sentences and use adjectives and prepositions (‘up, on, in, under’ etc.

Learning to talk is the key to how well your child learns everything else, so keep the conversation flowing and make sure your toddler has plenty to say for himself.