Communicating With a Baby

Everyone knows that adults have different communication styles. There are countless books on the subject, and really it’s just common sense. What I never realized before becoming a mom, though, is how many ways there are to communicate with a prelingual baby.

My husband and I have approached this very differently since our son was born in December. At first, it was a source of anxiety for me: what do I talk to him about? I was actually insecure about sounding “silly,” even though various books had told me that baby-talk is actually good for his language development.

As we’ve bonded over the past 11 weeks, though, I’ve developed my own style and place of comfort. Where my husband is happy to just randomly babble at our son – and I don’t mean baby-talk there, but rather just incessant chatter about things like the solar system and the periodic table – that’s not what works for me.

Likewise, I have a friend who specializes in “baby-scat.” Just like a jazz singer, she’ll improvise random syllables in different pitches and rhythms. The baby seems to enjoy it, even if no one else understands her. This, too, is outside of my comfort zone.

With me, the communication started at my son’s changing table. We spend a lot of time there, after all, so why not make it fun? We play little games, I tickle him, we smile at each other, and we mimic each other’s sounds and expressions. After a while, it becomes second-nature, even in public. I just needed to realize that everything, every smile and touch, is a way of communicating. Suddenly, it was so much easier.

The bottom line is, there is no “right” way to communicate with a child. If you’re comfortable, so will they be. Don’t worry about appropriateness or sounding silly. As an infant, the most important part is the attention you are paying to him or her. So babble away – whatever that word may mean to you.