What is it?

Beginning from when a child is born they are learning and developing pre-language or non-verbal skills which will support language learning. The pre-language skills they develop from a very early age and include:

Looking and Listening

As soon as the baby is born he will watch the mother's face. He learns to discriminate human faces and recognise which ones are most important. The ability to sustain eye contact will help the baby gain information about language from the mouth and face.

The same applies to listening: the child learns to recognise the human voice and determine which ones are the most important. The ability to filter out the human voice from background noise is a complex skill. (Think about trying to learn a foreign language, such as Chinese, in a disco. Think how difficult it would be to pick out the key words and other features against all the background noise).

Turn-taking

Turn-taking develops from the first weeks when the parent interprets the baby's noises, smiles, movements etc. and adds sounds, actions and words. The parent begins to leave ÒgapsÓ for the baby to make a response. Eventually baby and parent take turns with actions and sounds and later, words.

Smiling

From about 6 weeks a baby begins to smile. This further fosters social interaction because it is much more rewarding to interact when you get a response. Adults will initiate more communication with responsive babies.

Anticipation

By 3 months a baby shows excitement at the sound associated with different situations, e.g. running bathwater, approaching voices, etc. showing a developing understanding of situations.
Awareness of gesture and facial expression

From birth, babies build up the understanding that gestures and facial expressions carry meaning.

Copying

This fosters co-operation as well as social interaction. By 9 months, a child is able to copy hand clapping and playful vocal sounds e.g. smacking lips, coughing, ÓbrrrÓ, etc.

Joint attention

The ability to follow another person's focus of attention and also to direct someone else's attention to what you are interested in is a vital communication skill.

By 12 months, a child points with his index finger at objects or events which interest him. This further encourages adults to engage with the child and to name objects/events for the child. For most children, once words start to fill their slots, pointing becomes redundant and is discarded.

All these non-verbal skills continue to develop as the child's verbal skills emerge. Non-verbal and verbal communication skills are interlinked during all language learning.

Understanding

In the first 12 months understanding is based on cues in the environment, e.g. direction of eye gaze, facial expression, pointing, gestures. The child will understand ÒnoÓ and ÒbyeÓ by 12 months. For many children the main difficulty in understanding is that adults talk so fast children often do not have sufficient time to pick out the important words.

Expression

The baby will be communicating non-verbally through looking, facial expressions, body language, vocalisation and gesture. First words will appear at around 12- 15 months.