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| |    The Importance of Language by Robert Needlman, M.D., F.A.A.P. reviewed by Robert Needlman, M.D., F.A.A.P. Language is one of the most important areas of human development. Our communication skills set us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom, and they're also what brings us together with each other. Babies are born without language. By age five, most children know several thousand words, and have mastered almost all the rules of grammar. This incredible feat of learning is accomplished with little or no formal schooling. But it has everything to do with how you, as a parent, talk with your child. Fast and slow development Children develop language at different rates, and in different ways. While you can be confident that a child who is fast to talk and understand is intellectually bright, the opposite is not necessarily true--many children who are slow to talk are also bright. For other children, slowness to speak and understand is a sign of a language disorder or a more general problem of development, or perhaps a hearing deficit. Language delays need to be taken seriously, because sometimes--but not always-they point to problems that need early diagnosis and treatment. Connections Language is also important because it is connected with so many different aspects of a child's development. Right from the beginning, language development is all wrapped up with emotional development. Think about the baby gazing at his parent's face, and the parent who responds by cooing and smiling back. Along with love, the baby is learning about communication and social skills. When he's a little older, he will begin using language to express emotions. For children whose emotions are especially intense, language helps them get through the day with fewer tantrums. Language also connects with moral development. Starting at 18 months or so, children increasingly learn about right and wrong by listening to what their parents or other adult authorities tell them, and by repeating the words to themselves over and over. You can see this when a two-year-old reaches toward the oven door, then stops and tells herself, "No, no, hot!" Early language is also one of the best predictors of a child's later performance in school. By age five, a child who has significant speech or language delays has a high likelihood of eventually having trouble with reading. Often, these problems continue throughout school. Children with large vocabularies and a good grasp of grammatical rules have an easier time learning to read and write. The bottom line For many reasons, language development in the first five years of life is important. You can nurture your child's language by doing a lot of talking, listening, singing, playing, and reading. Other articles in this section will give you specific suggestions how. They'll also explore in more detail the ways in which language connects with many other areas of development. The more you understand about your child's developing language, the more amazing it is.
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