How to Help Your Baby Communicate

Cues are individualistic

Reading and Responding to Your Baby's Cues
How does your baby let you know what he wants? Can you tell when he's mad at you, or when he needs a cuddle? Does he show you that he wants a particular toy, or that he's hungry and thirsty? Every baby has his own gestural style, and some are clearly more theatrical than others. Maybe your baby has already demonstrated what a ham he is by the vividness of his facial expressions. He doesn't merely grin; he beams. When this child is angry, you get all the bells and whistles: wrinkled brow, trembling lip, and tears of rage. There may be a full display of kicking and flailing limbs, accompanied by indignant howls.

Babies who are clear signalers are more likely to get what they want because adults don't have to work at interpreting their gestures. If your infant is able to rely on his muscles he won't hesitate to reach toward you, and you'll know that he wants your company. If his facial muscles are similarly cooperative, he may find it easy to imitate the many expressions he's seen cross your face, and use them as he responds to you. Clear signalers usually have no difficulty expressing their feelings because they can readily use their senses of hearing, vision, touch, and smell to pick up the cues you send to them, and then use their muscles to send a return message. They'll preen in your direction, giving you a flirtatious look to let you know that they're ready, willing and able to interact with you. When a baby is this eager to communicate, it won't take very much practice on your part to learn how to read his squeals of joy, lunges for toys, or looks of disgust when he tastes lima beans for the first time.

Many babies offer less flamboyant cues when they express their feelings or respond to your overtures. If your baby has a more subtle style, you'll have to sharpen your observational powers. When your child wants to be picked up, he may not fix you in his eyes and reach out his arms. Instead, he may use a low-pitched whiny tone, or rattle the sides of his crib. He's using gestures that come easily to him to let you know what he wants, and over time you'll come to recognize his signaling pattern. Don't assume that your baby isn't responding to you or expressing a feeling just because he's not using the body language you had anticipated. Look for behavior that's easy for your baby to do—whether it's smiling, moving his limbs or babbling—and use it as the basis for your dialogue with him.

Some. babies are highly intentional, even when they are a little slow in their motor development. You may find that your baby will wiggle and roll across the floor to get to you, even if he can't crawl yet. He'll stare up at you with big, round eyes and you'll realize that he's asking you to pick him just as surely as if he raised his arms and said "Up!"

Other babies are more laid-back and exhibit more subdued responses. They may not answer your enthusiastic vocalizations with sounds of their own, but will smile. The fact that they can use a gesture of any kind to respond to yours is what's key here. Similarly, the particular ways you respond to your baby's gestures are not significant. As long as your child notes that you have received his message—by your head nod, a lilt in your voice, or even a grimace on your face—he will be getting a response, learning to be causal, and feeling secure in his new ability to communicate.

Although it's a good idea to respond to most of your baby's gestures, there's no need to try to reciprocate each and every one of his overtures. He'll be able to figure out the general drift of your responses, and you neither can nor should expect yourself to tune in to all of your baby's behaviors. You won't catch every nuance of his body language and will misunderstand some of his messages. As a result, your child will learn to accept delay and frustration as a part of life. However, only some babies have the fortitude to keep trying to catch your attention by vocalizing louder, clearing their throats, or giving you frustrated looks. You can't count on your baby to be a squeaky wheel when he needs more attention. Be proactive; look for any and all signs, overt and subtle, that your baby is trying to share a feeling or a desire with you.

Finally, parents need to recognize that their responses to their babies' gestural overtures should be not only reciprocal, but also on target. When your baby reaches out his arms to be picked up, the first words out of your mouth shouldn't be "Oh, look, your collar is sticking up!" Your accompanying gesture of smoothing his collar down in no way acknowledges your baby's clear, although nonverbal, desire to be picked up. Always let your baby know that he's been a successful communicator by responding to his gestural overture before you broaden the context of your interaction. Pick him up before you straighten his collar. Better still, fight your impulse to spruce him up. It's a losing battle!

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