Human beings are tuned into language from birth. The infant gurgles and the adult smiles or responds with words, beginning the lifelong give and take of communication. From sighing, cooing, and babbling to the first words, a baby can learn that language is a powerful tool in human society.

Children learn language by being with people who encourage their efforts to communicate and look for opportunities to communicate with them, first with speech and then with print. But children learn language not simply by being in a noisy, language-filled environment, rather through direct personal communication and by listening carefully to the dialogues of others.

While the outline and sequence of brain development is genetically programmed and heredity sets parameters for the child’s unique characteristics and potential, the quality of neurological development is derived from the child’s physical and social experience in the world. During the first three years of life, the unique architecture of a child’s brain grows from the interactions the child has with the world around him, and his or her emotional intelligence grows out of the relationships and interactions with adults.

Research indicates that a child’s early exposure to language in the first two or three years of life has lasting ramifications for language and cognitive development. (Hart and Risley,1995) Hart and Risley found a wide range in the number of words addressed to children under the age of 2, from three million words a year in some families to 11 million words a year in others. They concluded that the amount of talk families and caregivers direct to children is strongly associated with the child’s language growth. Children with fewer language interactions by age 2 were less competent using words in a conceptual manner and less competent problem solvers. What’s more, they never caught up. The quantity of “conversations” — responsive language interactions — in the earliest years appears to matter forever.

Reading to infants and toddlers is also important to literacy development. Infants between 6 and 12 months who are read to by their parents typically show monthly progress from grabbing and mouthing books, to "hinging" the covers, to turning the pages.

During ages 2 and 3, children advance from babbling to producing understandable speech in response to books and markings that they themselves create. Late in the second year or early in the third, many children produce reading like as well as drawing-like scribbles and recognizable letters or letter like forms (Snow, et.al. 1998). During this period, children develop expectations that certain kinds of intonations and wording are used with books and other written materials. Those who are read to frequently and enjoy such reading begin to recite key phrases or longer stretches of words specific to certain books. Late in this period, many children label and comment about pictured items, describe pictured actions, and engage in some question-and-answer dialogue and/or create voices for characters in pictures. (Snow, et.al. 1998)

Sources: Hart, B. & Risley, T, Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experiences of Young Children. Baltimore: Paul H Brookes, 1995.

Snow, C.E., Burns, M.S., & Griffin, P. (Eds.). Preventing Reading Difficulties in Young Children. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. 1998. Available online: http://books.nap.edu/html/prdyc/