Freya’s Words
By William Loftin
Abstract
Intro/Why: My name is William Loftin. My daughter Freya Loftin is fifteen months old. While she is saying quite a few words, I wanted to see if I could help her learn more words. I believe communication is extremely important in all aspects of life and helping my daughter communicate more effectively will give her a head start.
Question: By having short “classes” several times a day can I increase Freya’s vocabulary?
Literature:
Villano, Matt. "4 Fun Ways to Get Baby to Talk
"Help Your Child to Talk." Ed. Design Wildcat
"Baby Talk Milestones." WebMD
"How to Support Your Child's Communication Skills." ZERO TO THREE.
"Information for Parents Speech, Language and Communication Needs." Ed. Office of Public Sector
Procedure: Short classes spaced throughout the day
Learned: No measurable increase in vocabulary
Thoughts: While the classes didn’t seem to influence Freya’s vocabulary, they were enjoyable for both of us. I think she just wasn’t ready to add more words to her vocabulary yet. I did notice that while she isn’t saying many new words she seems to understand most of the words we used in the classes.
- Introduction
My name is William Loftin. I am currently enrolled at Texas A&M-Commerce. I am taking a class on research literature and technology and this is my research paper. I am focusing my research on a case study of my daughter Freya Kay Loftin. She is fourteen months old and I want to see if I can help her learn to talk and expand her vocabulary.
A little about myself. I started working as a carpenter with my uncles framing houses around Dallas when I was seventeen. I enjoyed the work but when I got married and had kids it wasn’t steady enough so I found a factory job. After a few years at the factory I had advanced as far as I could but I wasn’t happy. I didn’t feel like I was doing something important so I decided to join the Army. I loved being in the Army, I felt proud every day to wear my uniform and I felt I was doing something important. I was in the initial invasion or Iraq from Kuwait and I did some things there that still give me nightmares. I left the Army in 2004 because my wife at the time told me I could try and save our marriage or stay in the Army and be single. We ended up divorced in 2008. When I got out of the Army I went to school on the GI bill and got a degree in Criminal Justice. Something was wrong with me but I didn’t know what it was. I did a lot of self-medication with alcohol to get by. I applied to and was accepted to law school and graduated in 2010, things were getting worse with my PTSD but I still didn’t know what the problem was. I met my current wife in Ada OH and she helped hold me together for a while. I took the bar exam while working in factories in Illinois where my mom lives but I didn’t pass the exam. My financial situation got so bad that I had to file for bankruptcy which made me ineligible to sit for the bar exam for two years. I got a job driving trucks and eventually moved back to Texas to work for a propane company. While working delivering Propane I had several severe flashback panic attacks and went to the VA hospital where I was diagnosed with PTSD. Since then most of my time and energy is spent trying to cope with PTSD without going on alcoholic binges or getting into bar fights. I still wanted to progress in some way so I re enrolled in school thinking I may have to change my focus.
Currently I am on social security and VA disability. I don’t have a job and spend my days at home with my daughter. My wife has a job at Walmart so Freya and I are home alone much of the day. Freya was a bit of a surprise baby. My two older kids are twenty and twenty-one now so I honestly didn’t think I would be a father to a one-year-old at forty. It is a good surprise because as I spend time with Freya I realize just how much I missed when my older kids were young. When Ashley and Will were babies, I spend most of my time at work or deployed in the Army. It is something I chose because I wanted to provide a good life for them but there is always a tradeoff. Mine was that I missed a lot of their early life. I regret that now but I honestly don’t know what I could have done differently, bills must be paid. Since I am home with Freya most of the day I want to see what I can do to help her develop into the best person she can be.
I’m not sure what the future looks like. Most of the time I can’t see a future for myself. I know from the classes I’ve had at the VA hospital in Dallas that this shortened future is part of PTSD and isn’t reality but it clouds everything. I spent most of my life looking forward and striving to improve but since my PTSD has gotten worse it seems to take over a larger part of my life every day. Working became impossible a few years ago, I lost a lot by not being able to work. I don’t feel like I can provide for my family anymore so I lost a lot of self-respect. I try to keep a positive outlook and move forward but it isn’t easy. Crowds and personal interactions hurt. Not just mentally but physically as well, my heart beats so fast I think I may be having a heart attack and I get sweaty, sometimes it is all I can do to just try and function normally.
- Purpose
The purpose of my research is to see if by actively trying to expand Freya’s vocabulary I can help her learn to speak. I have read several articles on how to help children learn to speak and happily found that much of what they suggested I have already been doing with her. There are a few new ideas I would like to try from the articles and I want to see if setting aside specific time throughout the day will accelerate her learning.
- Research Question
By having short “classes” several times a day can I increase Freya’s vocabulary?
- Literature
I looked at several articles to see where I needed to start on designing a plan to teach my daughter to talk. In general, I had been doing much of what the articles recommended without knowing it. Everything I read recommended talking to your child about anything and everything. I have been doing that since she was born so I feel like I am on the right track, but I wanted to find some specific actions I could take to accelerate her learning process.
The first article I found was “4 fun ways to get baby to talk” by Matt Villano. He writes for and was published by Parenting magazine so is a relatively reputable source for information. The article talks a lot about the importance of just spending time talking with your child. I did get one specific idea from the article which eventually became “cooking lunch” class. What sparked this idea was the section in the article under total exposure. The article recommends using “self-talk” which is basically just telling her what you are doing as you do it. I thought about the things we do daily and one constant is lunch. I thought it might be more entertaining for her to hold the utensils I use for making her lunch as we talked about what I was doing and why. So far this is one of her favorite activities. I usually start it by asking her if she wants to help me make lunch and we head into the kitchen together. She helps me pick out a pan if we need one and a big spoon, everything we need to make lunch she helps pick out and we try to say the words for each thing. She helps me cook the food and we watch the timer together and count down how long until lunch will be ready. After we eat, she helps me do the lunch dishes and put them in the dishwasher.
The next article I read was "Help Your Child to Talk." Edited by wildcat Designs. This was a rather short article and many of the ideas were mirrored in the other articles I read but this one gave me the idea for the “song” class. The royal college of speech and language therapists sponsored the article, so again a reputable source. The idea behind this class is to get her to join you in singing short made up songs with rhyming words. This was I think her favorite class because she liked the interaction and rhyming. Sometimes we would just sing made up songs and sometimes we would sing songs that would play on Pandora.
Next article was "Baby Talk Milestones." A WebMD article. WebMD is not always a reliable source, but a medical doctor, Dr. Robb Hicks reviewed it so I believe it is accurate. The idea I took away from this article was the “outside trip” class. The article mentions “point and say” so I decided to do this when we take our walks. Freya has a wagon that she loves to ride in so I thought I would have her attention for the duration of our walks. I just added in pointing and saying what we say be it a car or a dog or whatever we ran into that day.
Next was the article "How to Support Your Child's Communication Skills." From the website ZERO TO THREE. It is from National Center for Infants, Toddlers and Families so a government source which leads me to believe it is accurate. The take away from this article was the “flashcards” class. I got some index cards and drew simple pictures and words on them for flashcards and we would flip through them and try to say the words. Freya was not as impressed as I hoped. She was more interested in playing with the cards or trying to eat them than saying what was on the card. This was the only class I ended up dropping from the list. I just added an extra singing class since that seemed to be her favorite.
The final article I used was "Information for Parents Speech, Language and Communication Needs." This is from Crown Publishing, Great Britain government. Government sources tend to be accurate and this was quite a long article. My take away from this was the “parts of the body” class. The idea is simple but it is mentioned several times through the article, basically just pointing and saying what parts of the body are. Nose, mouth, and chin are where we started, first I would touch and say mine and then touch and say hers. Then I would take her finger and point to mine and the point with her finger to hers. We moved on to eyes, ears and feet and while she only picked up eye, she would know where they were even if she couldn’t say the word for them.
- Methodology
I plan to set aside five training periods of 10-15 minutes each spaced throughout the day.
Each training period will focus on a different method of learning.
- Cooking lunch (explaining what the tools and food are and letting her touch them)
- Songs (Singing and rhyming)
- Flashcards with pictures and words
- Outside trip (talking about what we see and pointing)
- Parts of the body (saying and pointing at eyes nose etc.)
I don’t want to make a training period too long because I want her to be engaged.
The only training period that will be at the same time every day will be cooking lunch, the others will rotate and possibly be added as an extra or dropped depending on which she prefers.
- Data Gathering
Before I start I am going to try and get her to say every word I can for two days and record them on a sheet. At the end of the data collection I will spend two days again to see if she has learned a large amount of new words. Regardless if I do the training or not I expect there will be an increase or three to five words she would pick up naturally. I am hoping that with the training this will increase to more than ten words during the measuring period. At the end of the measured period a two-day recording of words will again be taken to compare with the original.
- Findings
Research data
13OCT2016
Started listing what words Freya currently knows
14OCT2016
Completed current word list
1. Mom
2. Dad
3. Dog
4. Moon
5. Thank you
6. No mam
7. No
8. Duck
9. Drink
10. Uh-oh
11. Yeah
12. Bye
13. Hi
15OCT2016
Begin training classes, not a lot of interest in all but the singing class
16OCT2016 – 21OCT2016
Continue classes
22OCT2016
It’s been a week of doing the classes daily. She was not interested in the flash cards, other than to eat them. She seemed to enjoy the singing class, the others were hit and miss, seemed to depend on her mood. I haven’t been able to get her to say any new words yet, but her “old” words are clearer. Meaning she seems to be getting better at singing them.
24OCT2016
Continue classes, stopped doing flashcards, just added in another singing class. Singing seems to be her favorite. Not getting any new words yet but getting vocalizations that are somewhat like words ie drink=deennn its not a lot but it is some progress
27OCT2016
Continue classes, been working hard for trick or treat but starting to think it’s a little beyond her right now. Added in a dress up type of class where I say the word for something and put it on her. She seems close to saying hat. Her old words are a bit clearer but still not perfect.
31OCT2016
Halloween, been continuing with the classes. Still working on drink and hat. Slow progress but still progress. Didn’t get trick or treat for Halloween but she did have a great time riding around in her wagon and knocking on doors.
05NOV2016
Drink is coming along well. dink is closest approximation I can get for it. Ay for hat, hard to make the h sound I’m thinking. She still enjoys the classes but we had to miss two days because she had teeth coming in and was extremely cranky. She would only say no when I would try to start the classes.
12NOV2016
Starting to wonder if the classes are having much effect. She is not saying anything new but she seems to love the classes. Maybe I’m making them too much like play? The articles said the best way was to keep her interested and engaged and she seems to be but as far as actually saying new words I can’t say she is learning anything more than she would have without the classes.
19NOV2016
Didn’t get as many days complete this week due to thanksgiving. We went to see my son Willy graduate basic training at Ft. Benning GA. I think she is trying to say Willy but can’t quite get it out. She says WAh. Nothing new from the classes been trying for cat and drink some progress but still not quite there.
26NOV2016
Got all the classes in this week, new word! Fly, I’m not sure I can take a lot of credit for it but it is in some of the songs we sing. She also can say bawk-bawk like a chicken and will say it when she sees one but not sure that really counts as a word. Still trying hard for cat and drink, I use them a lot and she makes some of the sounds for them just not fully formed words.
01DEC2016
Ending classes for the most part. Some progress this week on cat, not the C sound but the at is there. I think I will continue the classes just for fun even though I didn’t get the results I was hoping for. She seems to enjoy them and maybe I am just trying too soon with her being too young.
03DEC2016
Completed an ending word list only two new words.
1. Mom
2. Dad
3. Dog
4. Moon
5. Thank you
6. No mam
7. No
8. Duck
9. Drink
10. Uh-oh
11. Yeah
12. Bye
13. Hi
14. Fly
15. At
- Conclusion
I am surprised at the results of this research. I assumed that with daily work for about six weeks I would have dramatic results. While she did pick up two words during this time, I can’t really attribute this to the classes we were doing. Her word gain could have been just a natural growth. Now that I’ve completed the research project I wonder if my lack of results were due to problems with the classes I designed. While she enjoyed them for the most part (other than flashcards) maybe they should have been more focused. I wonder if maybe she just isn’t ready to say more yet. The articles I read before I started seemed like she was at the right age to start increasing her vocabulary but they also said every child is different.
Even with the results not being what I hoped for, I am still glad I did this research project. It let me spend more time with my daughter doing things we don’t always do together. It is interesting to note that while she didn’t speak any new words, she seems to know what they mean. An example is if you say “Where is Freya’s eye?” she will point to her eye. I think that can be directly attributed to the “parts of the body” class. As I mentioned earlier I think I will continue with the classes, Freya and I both enjoy them and they have become part of our routine. Even if they don’t increase her vocabulary now they might in the future as she gets a little older. Honestly it is just enjoyable spending this time with her.
Resources
Villano, Matt. "4 Fun Ways to Get Baby to Talk." Parenting. Parenting Magizine, n.d. Web. 01 Dec. 2016. http://www.parenting.com/article/teach-baby-to-talk
"Help Your Child to Talk." Help Your Child to Talk. Ed. Design Wildcat. Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, Oct. 2003. Web. 01 Dec. 2016. https://www.rcslt.org/docs/free-pub/helpyourchildtotalk.pdf
"Baby Talk Milestones." WebMD Baby Talk Milestones. Ed. Robb Hicks. WebMD, n.d. Web. 01 Dec. 2016. http://www.webmd.boots.com/children/baby/guide/baby-talk-your-babys-first-words
@ZEROTOTHREE. "How to Support Your Child's Communication Skills." ZERO TO THREE. N.p., 26 Feb. 2016. Web. 01 Dec. 2016. https://www.zerotothree.org/resources/302-how-to-support-your-child-s-communication-skills
"Information for Parents Speech, Language and Communication Needs." Information for Parents. Ed. Office of Public Sector Information Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright, 2010. Web. 01 Dec. 2016. http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130401151715/http://www.education.gov.uk/publications/eOrderingDownload/ES14-2010.pdf
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