Monday, October 08, 2007

Is This Possible?

Ada's new favorite word seems to be "Ada."

I've heard her say "Mama." (I really think she said it at least once, though it's definitely not part of her daily routine, yet.) She says "Dada" in appropriate contexts all the time. This morning, at 5:30, while she was reaching for him, was an especially appropriate context, in my opinion.

Ada sometimes repeats words she's hearing, too. At dinner, I might ask her if she's thirsty and wants water, and she'll say, "wawa." I was praising Ellie for having dry underpants recently, and Ada said, "dwy!" while clapping for her sister.

Today I held her up to a mirror, and she reached for her reflection, saying, "Ada!" (She also said Ada while reaching for her book later, and just as a noise to make from time to time.) She says her name the way Ellie does, which is slightly different from the way that Paul and I say it. The "A" is less of a hard sound, is almost a short "a."

Ada is 8 months old.

[Edited 10/15 to add that this morning, in response to a toy she couldn't see going "quack, quack, quack," Ada said "duck." Three adults heard her. That's a big cognitive leap: from labeling or repeating to knowing who makes what animal sound. Abstract!]

6 comments:

Orange said...

Are you sure you're not imagining things? :-)

I'm not one to ask. My son had a speech delay, and I didn't get a "mama" out of him 'til he was about 2 1/2.

Unknown said...

My niece is 8 1/2 months old and mutters "mama" and "dada" at completely inappropriate times. She also yelps "allllallhhhalalala." We hope that she connects "mama" with my sister, but know this will come with time. For now, yelps and giggles will do.

Brian said...

Sure thing. I started to speak in recognizable words well before my first birthday, and I could read by the time I was 2. And despite what I may like to think, I'm sure I was not the smartest baby ever born. =B^)

Books (and the Intarwebs) seem to uniformly claim that infants start using words between 12 and 18 months, but as for all milestones, that's for the average kid under the middle of the bell curve. That curve has long tails on both ends; there will always be a few kids who can do things earlier than the book says is "possible."

Sarahlynn said...

Orange, it's certainly possible! But not with "dada." She's really clear about that one, sprint-crawling for the front door calling, "Dada!" when he comes home from work.

Ellie's first word came when she was about 14 months old, and it was "Bubbles!" Mama came later.

Spazy, that's cute. : )

Brian, I have a friend who swears that both of her sons started talking at 6 months. I did hear one of them say something like, "hun-gee" when he wanted to nurse. I think some kids really do start talking quite early (though, often it's imitation).

Camera Obscura said...

I don't remember exactly when any of them started talking (there were no speech delays w/ #1-Son or Daughter) but I do remember distinctly noticing that the word "cute" got a big grin out of Daughter at four months, before she even recognized words like Mama or Daddy or milk or eat.

Sarahlynn said...

I bet she already knew that "cute" meant her. :)