Why do children speak?

By Michael Audas, Speech Pathologist

Have you ever asked yourself, “why do children start speaking?” It’s not a question that arises very often, as most of us take for granted that speaking is an all-but-inevitable occurrence in the development of a child that ‘just happens.’ To an extent, this is true: children are primed to learn language, and primed to speak, and this is why they begin babbling right from the crib.

But on the other hand, speaking, unlike breathing or digestion, is an entirely voluntary act: we can quite easily stop speaking without suffering any physical harm. Speaking has to be something we want to do in order for us to do it, so why do would we—and children—want speak? Here are two reasons: first, speaking is fun, and second, because someone is listening. It is this latter reason that I would like to focus on here.

We all want people listen, and we all want to be heard. This is, as I have just said, a big part of why we desire to speak in the first place. Perhaps, though, we might be somewhat saddened by reflecting on how seldom this actually occurs in our own lives and, by extension, the lives of children.

What, then, gets in the way of listening? It is usually not that someone is intentionally, or even negligently, oblivious to what we are saying. Rather, we all have a tendency to listen in a way that actually revolves a lot more around ourselves than it does the other person. When someone tells us a story from their personal history, the first thing we search for is a story of our own to match it. If we are successful in finding this match, we further believe that we have related to, and understood, the experience they are attempting to convey.

When we fail to relate to the other person’s story, we often come to the conclusion that we have not understood them or, worse, that they have not made themselves understood. In an effort to avoid this unpleasant conclusion, we can be wildly overzealous in attempting to assimilate someone’s story to our own; as a result, we become deaf to many of the unique features of the other’s story, and that person’s other-ness itself. We haven’t really listened to what makes them them.

If someone is not hearing our stories, with all of their idiosyncrasies and eccentricities—which are precisely the parts of the story which speak to who we are—our desire to continue communicating them may diminish. So how can we counteract this natural, but not always-ideal tendency, in our interactions with little storytellers?

If I were to propose that we attempt to ‘just listen,’ this might capture the essence of what is needed, but in a manner so vague as to not be useful. Instead, let me propose some specifics:

• Set aside a time and a place—preferably a quiet space—for some uninterrupted sharing time. Reading a book or engaging in some other activity that both of you enjoy can be a good way to break the ice.
• Exercise ‘hovering attention.’ This means leaving preconceptions and agendas at the door, and letting the child’s words percolate in your mind without being preoccupied immediately arriving at a particular interpretation.
• Ask your child to elaborate or explain things you don’t understand, rather than your first recourse being to attempt to make sense of what they have said for them.
• If your child is describing something that happened to them, ask them how that experience was for them, rather than telling them how it was for them, or might have been for you had you experienced the same.

Listening in this way is not easy. It runs counter to our inbuilt tendencies and long-cultivated habits. Nevertheless, I urge you to try, and see who you find!