Everyday Ways to Help a Toddler Talk

Three everyday habits support a toddler’s talking: describing what your toddler is already looking at, pausing for a reply, and saying your toddler’s words back with a little more added. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association includes all three among the ways adults encourage language, and although none can set a toddler’s timetable, each gives more chances to hear and use words.

What you’ll learn

• Three everyday habits that support a toddler’s talking, and why each one helps
• What reviews of parent-led help found, and what they cannot promise
• How expanding and recasting sound in ordinary conversation
• Which signs call for a professional before any routine at home

Are There Shortcuts for Helping a Toddler Talk?

None of the large reviews of what parents can do at home measured how soon children started talking, so no everyday technique comes with a promise about speed. What the reviews did measure was whether children’s language grew when parents learned a few techniques and used them through ordinary days, and on average, children whose parents learned them showed moderately better language.

A 2011 review in the American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology found that help with language given by parents had a significant, positive effect for children aged 18 months to five years with language difficulties. A larger 2019 review of 76 studies in the journal JAMA Pediatrics linked parent training to moderately better language in children, and the strategy parents were taught most often, in 63 of those studies, was responsiveness, meaning answering whatever a child communicates.

Much of this research involved children with language difficulties or at risk of them, so the findings describe groups, not a forecast for one toddler. Even so, responsiveness makes a sensible first step today: pick one routine the family already has, such as breakfast or bath time, and use it to answer whatever your toddler is focused on. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) takes the same approach, describing speech-language pathologists working with families on routines and everyday activities to find chances for language learning.

How talking grows through these years is the subject of speech and language development, and how much talk a child hears is a separate question, covered in language exposure and speech.

Talking About What Your Toddler Is Looking At

Following a toddler’s lead means joining whatever the toddler has already chosen, a toy, a picture or a spoon, and putting words to it. Early language is carried by shared attention, meaning an adult and a toddler attending to one thing together, so a word about the thing in a toddler’s hands arrives while the child is already paying attention.

ASHA lists responses tied directly to what a child is trying to communicate among the interaction styles that encourage language. At home that means describing what your toddler is doing, as in “You’re stirring. Stir, stir,” instead of prompting for a particular word, because being put on the spot quiets a young child more often than it draws words out.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggests facing a toddler at eye level when possible, so the child can watch your face as well as hear the words, and a chair pulled up beside the high chair gets you there as surely as sitting on the floor.

From clinical practice

Talking about whatever a toddler is already looking at, instead of steering toward what the adult meant to talk about, is the change adults tend to find hardest. Steering comes easily to the one who knows the words.

Following puts each word where the child’s attention already is. Steering asks a toddler to leave one interest for another before a word can land. When the adult follows, the word arrives while the toddler is looking at the thing it names.

Giving a Toddler Time to Answer

Expectant waiting means pausing so a toddler has room to communicate, and ASHA names giving a child enough time to begin an exchange and to respond to adults as another style that encourages language. The pause matters because a toddler’s answer can still be on its way after an adult would normally speak again.

A pause that feels a little too long to an adult is often about right for a late talker, so stay quiet longer than feels natural before speaking again. A point, a sound or a word can each be the toddler’s turn.

The pause helps without a question too, because a stretch of quiet after you name what your toddler is doing leaves room for your toddler to start the next exchange, not only to answer one.

Adding Words to What Your Toddler Says

Expanding means repeating what a toddler says and adding a little to it, in grammar, meaning or both, and it is the third style on the same ASHA list. ASHA’s advice to parents of children aged two to four is to repeat what a child says, which shows the child they were understood, and then add on. The CDC’s example for an 18-month-old is answering “Dog” with “Yes, that’s a dog.”

Expanding also lets a child hear the full version of words they can only partly say. For 2-year-olds, the CDC suggests saying a child’s attempt back clearly, so “or nana” is answered with “You want more banana,” and the child hears how the words sound before being able to say them clearly. A gesture can be expanded too, as when a toddler holds up a shoe and hears “Shoes on? You want your shoes on,” and then gets help with them, which shows that communicating gets results.

Recasting a Toddler’s Words in a New Form

A recast is a kind of expansion that keeps the child’s meaning but changes the grammar, for example by turning a statement into a question, so a toddler who says “Car go” might hear “Is the car going?” The toddler hears their own idea come back in a fuller shape, and the conversation carries on.

A 2015 review of recasting, summarized on ASHA’s Evidence Maps, looked at grammar development in children with language difficulties and concluded that interventions using conversational recasts as a key ingredient appeared to be effective. The same review found the evidence for recasting used on its own inconclusive, so recasts have the clearest support as one part of a responsive way of talking, not as a single technique to drill.

Can Everyday Talk Help a Late Talker Catch Up?

By age three, roughly half of late talkers have caught up without extra help, which also means the rest have not, and there is no way to know ahead of time which group a given toddler belongs to. ASHA notes that at the start, a child whose language will stay delayed is hard to tell apart from a late bloomer, because the difference only shows afterward.

The reviews found a real but moderate benefit across groups of children, and a group result cannot say whether any one toddler catches up, or how quickly. Late talking usually has no single identifiable cause, and parenting is not what brings it on, so a slow start is no sign that anyone missed these habits.

Home habits are no substitute for an evaluation, and they suit a toddler who understands what is said and isn’t talking much yet. What speech delay in children means is worth reading when the question is whether a toddler’s talking amounts to a delay, and late talking at age two explains how words are counted at that age.

Signs That Need a Call Before Home Habits

Two situations call for a professional before any home habit: a toddler who has stopped using words they used to say, and a toddler who might not hear well. The CDC’s Learn the Signs, Act Early program treats losing words as worth a call on its own at any age, because losing a skill is a different matter from gaining skills slowly, and it is something a clinician wants to hear about right away.

The American Academy of Pediatrics advises starting any speech concern with a hearing check, since ear infections that keep coming back can cause hearing loss that comes and goes, and that alone can slow a child’s language. Passing the newborn hearing test does not rule out a later problem either, because hearing loss can develop afterward, as the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders points out.

A parent can contact the state’s early intervention program directly, with no referral from a pediatrician, because Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requires state programs to take referrals straight from parents. The evaluation is provided at public expense in every state, and a parent who has been advised to wait is still free to make the call.

Common Questions From Parents

How Can I Get My Toddler to Talk More?

Describe whatever your toddler is focused on, pause after you speak, and repeat your toddler’s words with something added. Each habit gives a toddler more chances to talk, and all three fit into meals, baths and play, with no special lesson or toy.

What Is Recasting?

Recasting is saying a child’s words back in a new form, for example as a question, while keeping the meaning. A toddler who says “Baby sleep” might hear “Is the baby sleeping?” A 2015 review summarized by ASHA found recasts appeared effective within wider support, though evidence for recasting alone was inconclusive.

How Long Should I Wait for My Toddler to Answer?

Longer than feels comfortable. Let the quiet run on before you speak again, because an answer may still be on its way. A point, a sound or a word all count.

Should I Make My Toddler Say the Word Before Giving Him What He Wants?

No. Holding something back until the word comes turns a request into a test, and pressure tends to quiet a toddler. Say the word yourself as you hand it over, which shows your toddler that communicating works.

Do Flash Cards Help Toddlers Learn to Talk?

The reviews of parent-led help did not test flash cards. A 2020 review in Early Childhood Research Quarterly found that parent-led help built around play, daily routines or shared books had a moderate effect on the words children say.

Reviewed by Monica d’Errico-Franklin, M.S., CCC-SLP

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