From Syllables to Sentences

How Toddlers Learn Language

By Teri Brown

How a child goes from crying or yelling when they need something to asking for it in the span of three short years is a never-ending source of fascination for parents. The original research of Meredith Brinster, a recent graduate from John Hopkins University, suggests that toddlers learn words better by inference than they do direct teaching.

According to a recent John Hopkin's press release, Brinster, from Medford, N.J., designed a study to measure which word-learning strategy was more effective: direct instruction, in which an adult "directly" points to and names an unfamiliar object, or inference, in which toddlers use reason (such as process of elimination) to mentally "fasten" an unfamiliar word to an unfamiliar object. Based on previous research, Brinster posited that the young children would learn words more quickly through inference.

Her preliminary results showed that she was correct and toddlers learn new words more easily when they figure out the word's meaning for themselves. If more research bears out this conclusion, then the way we teach language may be revolutionized.

Dr. Lauren Bradway is a speech language pathologist and author of the book How to Maximize Your Child's Learning Ability (Square One Publishers, 2003). After 30 plus years' experience with children and families, she isn't sure that inference is preferable over teaching.

"This would imply that it's best to hand a toddler a brush and let him figure out how to use it!" Dr. Bradway says. "It makes more sense to demonstrate the use of the brush, name it for the baby and use the word daily with him or her. On the average, a child needs to hear a new vocabulary item at least 20 times before he or she uses it spontaneously."

Babies are neurologically wired to talk; you might even say they are born to talk. According to Dr. Bradway, while toddlers have an inborn drive to speak, the actual words they learn to say must be taught by the parent.

Want to see more?

• Check out our Article Library.
• Toddler Talking: Common Speech Problems in Young Children
• Baby Talk: Does Tongue-tie Affect Speech?
• Talking Toddlers Telling Tales: Speech Milestones and Tips
  for Parents
• Talk about it!