Words and Whirly Birds

Kids’ language acquisition never ceases to amaze me.  As of January, Jimmy’s entire vocabulary consisted only of the words “All done” (pronounced “A-dah”), “Daddy, “Bubba,” “oh dear” (oh-dee), “please” (pee), “bowl” (boh), “stuck” (a gutteral “kah”), “blanket” (bee), “hot” (ha), and occasional “mama.”  We had him evaluated by early intervention specialists, who said we didn’t need to worry because although his expressive speech was delayed, his receptive speech (what he understood) was just fine.  Furthermore, he communicated his needs extremely effectively through pointing and gesticulating (and forcibly moving our faces where he wanted us to look). 

Not one week after that evaluation, Jimmy decided he was done being the strong, silent type.  Within a few days, he added “more” (mo), “boo”, “ball” (ba), “yucky” (gacky), “no,” “boat” (bo), “ice” (i).  And since then, his language exploded.  I can’t even count all his words now!  He still uses a few words to get most of his needs met – notably, “no” and “me” and “ice” (now pronounced “eyesh”) are in heavy rotation.  And he still uses a lot of Jimmy-invented sign language, like pointing to his head to indicate he wants his daddy to fly the remote-control helicopter.  Why, you may ask, would he point to his head?  Don’t all toy helicopters take off from little boys’ noggins?

Here’s a video of Jimmy using a few of his words and being his normal busy little self: