words

Language is an amazing and confusing thing and I am thankful that I cannot remember the process of learning it- it was probably so frustrating!  It is very fascinating watching someone obtain language and the process that they go through to decipher all of the sounds, meanings and the very act of saying words.

picture via

Some observations I have made so far, although in no way scientific.  One is that we are able to retain and understand language way before we can use it.  This is a very fascinating and frustrating thing sometimes.  For instance, Aven knows when we are getting ready for bed that if I take off her dirty clothes and hand them to her that she should take them to her dirty laundry basket from many practices and verbal instructions although none of this could she verbally repeat.  The next is that there are so many different representations of objects in the world around us, especially in books.  When you try to teach your child a pretty basic word like dog, you realize that there are so many different kinds of breeds and each one looks different; there are many different representations of dogs also such as cartoon pictures, drawings, paintings and even real photographs and they are all dogs!

Lately Aven has been picking up new words right and left.  Her first words I think were actually "what's that" not even Mommy or Daddy.  This has enabled her to learn a lot about the world around her though by asking questions and discovering what things are.

Words she knows and uses now are: up, Mommy, Daddy, doggie, yes, no, what's that, please (ese), more, and sometimes open.  Every day it seems like she tries new ones out but then doesn't quite get it so gives up on it temporarily.  She does funny things and cute things now like going to the back door and pointing at the shop and saying Daddy?  Daddy?  Daddy?  She will point out dogs in lots of different books and even did it on a bag of dog food this morning.  She says "up" for down too and when I say "down?"  she nods her head yes, pretty funny.  She will adamantly say "no" to certain foods I offer her and when I offer her one that she wants, she clearly nods and says "yes."  It is really fascinating watching her figure out the world around her.