6 Minute English from BBC LearningEnglish.com

Hello, this is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English.

I'm Phil and I'm Georgie.

For most parents, their baby's first word is a special moment.

This happens after an early stage of language development called Babel, when babies start

making simple sounds like gah or ma. Babies have to learn to use their mouth muscles to make specific

sounds. They experiment with different sounds and mouth shapes. So what exactly is happening when

babies start learning to speak? What do you think, Georgie?

Well, Phil, I'm no expert, but I imagine they watch the adults around them and kind of copy and

imitate what they do. What do you think? I definitely think that's what my children did when they

were learning to speak. Well, let's compare our ideas with those of an expert.

Professor Julian Pine from Liverpool University, speaking here on BBC Radio 4, and he lists the

skills that babies develop in order to speak. Well, one of the first things the child's got to do is

they've got to break down the speech stream got to do is they've got to break down

the speech stream into words. Then they've got to link the words to the things that they refer to

in the environment, so they've got to learn what the words mean. Right. In this program, we'll discover

how babies learn to speak, and as usual, we'll learn some useful new vocabulary. And on the subject of words, remember, you can find a list of this programme's vocabulary

on our website, BBClearningEnglish.com.

Some people find it helpful to study the vocabulary before listening.

And another thing to do before listening is ask my question.

Georgie, we've mentioned the babbling noises that babies make when learning to speak,

but at what age does this usually start?

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