Language Development from 0-18 months

It seemed like one second I was counting down the days until my due date and the next

second I was lighting the gold "1" candle on my daughter's first birthday cake. How had a year passed so quickly? Now we're nearing the 18 month mark and I keep wishing there was a way to bottle up moments to bask in later: her warm fresh smell right after a bath, the way she sleeps with her bum up in the air, her first coos. Instead I just try to savor every moment of it as much as I can.

I am constantly amazed at the development that happens in the first few years of life. Just over a year ago, my baby slept most of the days away, couldn't roll over or sit, and communicated mainly by crying. Now she's toddling around, climbing on chairs and couches, and constantly babbling, and I'm lucky if I can get her down for at least one solid nap a day.

Of course, as a speech therapist, language development has been one of my favorite things to watch. Before your baby says his first word, he is listening to the sounds around him. He's learning the intonation patterns of his native language, paying attention to the phonetic contrasts in words, and distinguishing which sounds are meaningful. Here's what's going on in your baby's language development from birth to 1.5 years.

0-2 months

Reflexive sounds: these are the first kinds of sounds your baby will make. Fussing, crying, burping, and sneezing are all reflexive sounds. Your baby doesn't have control over these sounds, but as his parent, you may find yourself recognizing certain cries as a "hungry cry" or "tired cry" and may be able to interpret what your baby is needing.

1-4 months

Control of phonation: This stage is when the coos begin to emerge. These are mostly vowel-like sounds, with consonant sounds produced far back in the throat, like "goooo" or "cooo." These sounds don't require much movement of the tongue or mouth and are easier for an infant to make. Other sounds in this stage might be clicking the tongue or blowing raspberries.

3-8 months

Expansion: During this stage, your baby is gaining more control over his articulators (tongue, jaw, new teeth, etc.) and can produce adult-similar isolated vowel sounds and glides. If your baby is in this stage you might hear lots of squealing as he experiments with the pitch and loudness of his voice.

5-10 months

Basic canonical syllables: Single consonant-vowel syllables begin to appear in this stage and your baby may start to babble. Reduplicated babbling is when your baby produces the same C-V pairs, like "ba ba ba ba ba" and variegated babbling is when your baby produces non-repeating C-V pairs, like "ga ba da goo." My personal favorite example of this is when my baby said "Go Bob."

9-18 months

Advanced forms: In this stage, babies start to produce "diphthongs," which are two-part vowel sounds in the same syllable, like the "oy" in "boy." Your baby will also start to learn to combine consonants and vowels in different ways and jargon starts to appear. Jargon is a kind of multisyllabic babbling that starts to follow the stress and intonation patterns of your baby's native language. This is such a fun stage and can be a great opportunity for building language by treating your baby's jargon as actual conversation.

When my baby was 3 months old, I didn't know how she could get more perfect than with her tiny coos. At 9 months when she could babble and interact more, I decided that was my favorite stage. Now she's speaking in jargon all the time and I'm realizing that each new stage is going to be my favorite one. So as hard as it is to watch each milestone come and go, I take comfort knowing that I'm going to love what comes next.

Tell me what stage your little one is in, and what has been your favorite stage so far!