Language Modeling

And! Here’s the first Little Stories Classic and how the term Milk Mommy came to be. Read it to see if you’re a Milk Mommy (or Daddy).

Although we need to talk to our children to allow them to HEAR language, we must focus on what we say very carefully so that it is salient and meaningful. To children, adult chatter can sound like a whole lot of NOTHING.  Remember the adults in Charlie Brown? When we talk a lot and say too much, we end up saying nothing at all.

But what SHOULD I say?

First, let’s laugh at an example that none of us would EVER do! Let’s say someone else picked the page for “milk” for her son who is not yet saying any words.  Milk is her son’s favorite and she knows she can work on it throughout his day. So far she’s picked a great page. Good for her! Now, let’s see how she does putting marks on that page.

Yesterday, when she went to start putting marks on the page, she said something like this, “Oh, you’re ready for some milk now? I know. You love your milk. Ok, wait a second and mommy will go get it. I have to find your cup. Here it is. Let’s go to the fridge and fill it up. There you go. Isn’t that yummy?”.

Hmm. Let’s think. How’d she do?

You probably noticed she actually only said the word “milk” two times in almost 50 words. You can imagine how “milk” would get lost in of all that chatter. It turns out that she put different marks on a whole bunch of different pages instead of many marks on the page for “milk.” In this interaction no pages got filled, especially not “milk”, and her child probably ignored most of what she said.

But, we would never do that. At least not today, because today we will get focused.  We will say less, but end up really saying more because what we say will be meaningful. To do that we are going to zoom in to our child’s Zone of Proximal Development.

What’s the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)?

This is it…

It may have a big fancy name, but it’s actually very simple. The green circle is what your child can do or say on their own. The purple circle around it is what they are able to do or say with just a little help.  In language, the part of the purple circle comes in the form of a great parent model – a parent who knows just what to say to help their child be able to say a little more himself.

The woman talking about “milk” in 49 words other than “milk”, was not being a great model according to ZPD.  She was all the way out in the white space, outside of the circles, talking to herself.

But if YOU can stay in the purple circle, and you can stay just one level above what your child can naturally do on his own, your child is going to be able to join you more easily and expand the inside circle to do more each day. In the purple circle you are in the zone and being a great language model.

But how do I know what is the ZPD for MY child?

Well you tell me. What can your child do on her own? That helps you determine how you should be talking to her and how you can stay in the ZPD.

If your child is not yet using words on her own, you should only be using one-word sentences to talk to her. If your child is using single words, you should be using two-word sentences to talk to her.

It doesn’t mean that your child can’t UNDERSTAND longer sentences.  Instead, it means that you are focusing your efforts, putting more marks on fewer pages, and filling those pages so your child can SAY more. It also doesn’t mean that you’re never going to use longer sentences, it just means that when you get focused on what you’re saying during your interactions with your child they are probably going to be more meaningful interactions. Those more meaningful interactions will then help your child fill pages more quickly.

So…

If you want your child to say more, talk less and talk smart. Make what you say more meaningful by staying in your child’s ZPD and filling up the pages you’ve chosen more quickly.