6 mo. milestone "imitates sounds"

[akat]

On the milestones chart for 6 months old, it says, 'Imitates sounds'. What exactly does that mean? Does that mean if I say, "Ba", he'll say, "Ba" right back?

[Catubodua]

for us it means he says "hi" back to us sometimes and will give us a raspberry back if we do one towards him.

[toughcookie]

i'd interpret that pretty loosely. there is nothing i can do to sammy that he will do right back to me - he usually looks amused though. then later, he will make that sound randomly. especially raspberries and trilled R's, or a pterodactyl squawk. he's almost 8 months (next week). i'm not concerned at all - he is so vocal, and has discovered the D's (dadadada), which for some reason is way cuter than the vowels alone. just waiting for a mamamama....

[akat]

He says, "Mamamambamambabababa" and "Bababububa", but just when he feels like it, not in response to me. He'll raspberry back and forth with me but he starts it and I imitate him, not the other way around.

When he was a newborn, if we stuck our tongue out, he would do it back.

[akat]

My older one did m's and b's before d's, too.

[toughcookie]

ah, so he's got a mind of his own, AND is training you!

really, sounds like no worries...

[ErinYay]

The Denver Dev Chart shows "imitate speech sounds" as a separate milestone from "single syllables," "mama/dada indiscriminate," "vocalizes" and "jabbers."

In my book, "vocalize" (a very early milestone) is "makes noise from the general mouth area." "Imitate speech sounds" (next, from 2-9 mo) is "makes sounds that other humans make, but not necessarily directly after hearing them."

While a lot of babies DO mimic, even very early on, I don't think "imitate speech" means "mimics speech."

Long story short- your babe is right on track!

[akat]

thanks everyone, and ErinYay, thanks for the detailed explanation.