Fey, M.; Weiss, A.L. Language intervention with young children. Top. Lang. Disord. 1987, 7, 76–78. [ Google Scholar] [ CrossRef] Often (but not always) by the time a child uses about 50 single words, signs or pictures, he’s ready to begin putting them together in combinations like “More juice” or “Mommy up.” These two-word combinations sometimes send a clear message, as in “Want teddy.” However, you may need to look for clues to figure out exactly what a Combiner means.

The Discoverer is in the earliest stage of learning to communicate. He does not yet know how to communicate deliberately (with a specific purpose in mind). He just reacts to how he is feeling and to what is happening around him, which we call responding “reflexively”. ►How the Discoverer Expresses Himself Morgan, L.; Delehanty, A.; Dillon, J.C.; Schatschneider, C.; Wetherby, A.M. Measures of early social communication and vocabulary production to predict language outcomes at two and three years in late-talking toddlers. Early Child. Res. Q. 2020, 51, 366–378. [ Google Scholar] [ CrossRef] Discover how to get “in-tune” with your child’s communication and interests so that he’ll be more motivated to interact and communicate with you. Read through the chapter titles of the It Takes Two to Talk guidebook below to see what you'll be learning:

Institutional Review Board Statement

As a world-renowned leader in early childhood language intervention, The Hanen Centre’s mission is to help parents, caregivers, early childhood educators and speech-language pathologists promote the best possible communication skills in young children. Watt, N.; Wetherby, A.; Shumway, S. Prelinguistic Predictors of Language Outcome at 3 Years of Age. J. Speech Lang. Hear. Res. 2006, 49, 1224–1237. [ Google Scholar] [ CrossRef]

Joint attention also allows the Communicator to learn to follow your focus. If you point to something, he can now look in that direction to see what you’re showing him. Now you can point out lots of interesting things – creating all kinds of opportunities for language learning. So the Hanen Centre’s expert speech-language pathologists set to work to create an innovative program, It Takes Two to Talk, which gathered small groups of parents together to teach them how they could assume a primary role in helping their children develop improved communication skills.By learning in a small group with other parents, you get support and input from people who understand what you are going through. Not only do you walk away from the program armed with strategies that are proven to improve your child's language development, but you also gain a valuable support network of peers.