The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1933-10-19
sAUK CENTRE HERALD, Sank Centre, Milan.

lAlthough children are normally fin-
ished with baby talk by the time
they are ready for kindergarten
certain circumstances may cause
a reversion to the old habits. Jeans
parents, and her older brother and
sister were very careful to speak
slowly and distinctly when Jean
was about, but the baby talk per
sisted. Wherein my bal?" shed
say, and "Thee the thquirrel."
Jean is long past being unable
to say the letter IS" at the begin
ming of word" her mother sighed.
I'm sure I'll be thankful when
she may enter kindergarten in jan
uary.' That was the clue. "Who
are jeans playmates?" we asked
It developed that all the children
Jean had been playing with were
slightly older than she, and had
gone off to school or kindergarten
in September. That left no one for
Jean to play with during the great
er part of the day except three
year-old Janet, who had a speech
difficulty. Jean thought this high
ly amusing and was initiating "the
baby" Janet could speak quite
plainly, and would do so when cor
rected, but she had been allowed to
speak with many letter substitu-
tons; In fact her "baby talk" had
been allowed to speak with man,
letter substitutions; in fact her
baby talk" had been laughed at,
initiated, and encouraged at hom.,
until now it was becoming habit.
AS for Jean, she was trying to
put herself on the same plane with
Janet so long as her companionship
was confined to this one child. She
would drop the habit quickly
enough when she again entered in
to a larger group of children.
Jeans mothers problem now was
whether she should keep Jean away
from Janet, and so deprive her of
all but adult companionship, or
whether she should try to correct
Janet. She decided to try the lat
ter first.
Janet had been much babied at
home. Like all normal children,
she reacted pretty much according
to what was expected of her. When
jeans mother and sister-and Jean
herself-began treating her as if
she were capable Of more grown
up behavior, Jean responded with
more careful speech.
Then there was Bobby. Bobby
had been i'll for many weeks, very
i'll with a high fever, and when he
began getting better, he was so
weak he could stand on his legs
for only a short time. With the
feeling of helplessness and depend
ence, so like that of q much young
er child, came a return Of baby
talk. AS he grew stronger, this
disappeared.
So-called "babytalk" may be the
result of misunderstanding. Adults
often speak SO hurriedly or slur
their words so that the child does
not understand correctly and imi-
tates the sounds as he hears them.
Sometimes there is one word which
seems correct to them although it
Is not. There was the child who
insisted that window was the
baby word, and "wIndle" the cor
rect one because it sounded more
grown up.
It is natural that children can
say sounds like I'd" and "p" and "b"
which require only movement of the
lips, before they are able to make
the more intricate movements of
the teeth and tongue required to
sound many letters. Often this
baby talk" is amusing that par
ents unwittingly prolong it by i'm
itating it-and occasionally they
foolishly talk it back to the child.
Many children begin to speak
plainly as soon as they are able
to speak at all. They won't have
much vocabulary to begin with;
som etimes they won't be able to
make a particularly difficult cound