Without saying a word, you've communicated with your baby from your first touch. She's told you she's wet, tired or hungry, and you've shown her that you understand. As she outgrows her newborn sleepers and begins to wear out the knees in her overalls, she'll begin to use her voice for noises other than babbling and crying.

Your baby's first words begin long before he actually forms a word. His babbling and cooing signify his first attempts to interact with you while he explores what his mouth can do. Your reactions to those noises encourage him to continue making sounds. By interpreting the sounds you hear as words, you reinforce the babble.

"A baby babbles randomly and happens to say 'ma, ma, ma,'" says Mindy Hudon, M.S., CCC-SLP, certified speech and language pathologist. "Mom reacts positively. The baby begins to associate 'ma, ma, ma' for that nice lady who feeds, changes and holds her. As your baby grows and experiments with babbling, he learns to make very cool sounds that others respond to."

Before her first birthday your baby will do all her talking when she is content, making friendly or joyful noises. If she's cross or distressed, she probably won't talk; she'll cry. Her first speech involves interacting with you when she is happy, rather than communicating a need.

"Babies are like little sponges," Hudon says. "They absorb what they see, hear, taste and touch." Although your baby knows how to babble from birth, she learns speech sounds and patterns from you. She learns to exclaim, pause, speak again and then chat some more just by listening.

In the second half of her first year, you'll probably catch her practicing while you're not in the room. When she wakes up in the morning or when she's alone in the playpen, you may hear a chorus of delighted talk. She behaves as if you are in the room and talking to her. She carries on long, babbling conversations, making a sound, pausing for the response and then responding.

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