Dr. Sally Ward has written a book called "BabyTalk" on how to
talk to your
baby. Much of it is
intuitive but some is quite helpful. She has research showing higher
IQs at 8 years of age for children of parents who used her program. Many parents know lots of talking to babies is good but what I find valuable about this book is the discussion of the quality not just the quantity of the talk. For instance, she tells us not to ask the baby "what is X, Y, or Z" before 16 months of age because the child is not yet able to articulate adequately and this just makes them feel bad.
Dr. Ward also recommends reducing background noise and spending time dedicated to talking to baby, using names instead of pronouns, using lots of repetition of the same word in different contexts and talking about what the baby is interested in - not just following the parent's agenda.
This so much reminds me of
swankivy's frustrated baby node above. I decided to place this write up here, despite the fact that the
book's title is just one word (BAbyTalk)with funky capitalization.