More on language

Since that last post I've been thinking even more about the boos' language development, and thus listening more closely to them. So here are some corrections and additions:

1. It's NOT just my bad ears, they mix up kee-kee, kee-tee, and tee-tee all the time. Baby B calls our cat "kee-kee" which is also his word for "cookie" and Baby A sometimes calls the cat "dih-dee," so no wonder I'm confused. And cookies are sometimes called "tih-tee." So it's all a mess. I think that t, d, and k are kind of all the same sound for them -- they hear differences when I say the sounds, but they don't know they aren't distinguishing between them in their own speech. They're still learning their way around their own mouths.

2. In addition to "bee" (bees and assorted little bugs) and "bee" (raisins and other small dark food items), there is also "bee-bee" (toothpaste). Explain that one!

3. Baby B has started to call sheep "sheep" instead of "cow." A horse is still called cow, a pig is still called cow, but not a sheep. I don't know why sheep are so special. However, we saw a horse at the park last week, and both babies call that a horse (at the park they point to where the horse was and say "man hor" because a man was sitting on the horse).

4. In Ridgecrest we don't have any crows, only ravens. I have taught the boos that those big black birds all over everywhere are ravens, and they have been calling them either "ray-ray" or "ah-ah" (which is their general word for bird -- I think it's actually derived from the sound the ravens make). But last week Baby A started calling them "coh" (crow). He already knew the word for crow because we have a book called "A Crow's Journey." What's interesting about this (to me) is that crows are sort of the more generic big black bird -- but how would Baby A know that? We read one book -- but the ravens are everywhere and I always call them ravens. I want to blame this on daycare, but in this hot weather they don't use the outside playground, so there would have been no opportunity for a teacher to refer to a raven as a crow.

5. My stuffed penguin is called "ah-ah." At first I thought they had just made that up as a name for a penguin, but now it's clear that "ah-ah" is their generic name for bird. I think this is kind of amazing, because it means they recognize that a penguin is a bird. A penguin is a very un-typical bird!

6. Baby B calls his stuffed duck, "Duh'-tee," with kind of a glottal stop after the first syllable. That must be the result of an early attempt at "k" midstream. I think he can say "k" in the middle of a word now, but maybe he couldn't when he first got Ducky? I think "Duh'-tee" is a cute name and often pronounce it that way too.

7. Boos have learned to recognize the letter A. Baby B has a shirt that says "A is for Awesome" and they both point at it and say "A." Today, Baby A pointed to the back of Baby B's Nikes and said, in surprise, "A!" (Baby B's name begins with A, so we have marked his shoes with an A.) I know this is daycare's fault and they seem too young to have learned a letter, but still it is kind of exciting.

I still go back and forth on whether I should get them some speech therapy, but it is so fun just watching them grow and change. Maybe if they stop making progress I'll look into it. For now I think we're OK.