Show bad example to use baby talk elders should set right copy in wholesome language and conversation by EMMA GARY WALLACE national kindergarten association baby talk on the part ot of older persons may at times sound cunning and aad even amusing when imitated by the youngest of the family but it fair to the child why deliberately set act a faulty copy which he will continue to follow and eventually have to unlearn A little child has a great deal to learn in this big and complex comple ox world into which he has come and we must admit that th it he be learns an amazing number of things in the first few months and years W why hy complicate matters for him among other things he has to learn the use of lips and tongue and teeth and throat muscles in makin making sounds and he has to learn combinations bi of sounds bounds and connect them with objects and actions and emotions of different kinds you would expect that all persons who profess devotion to him would faithfully watch for the syllables or letters over which his unaccustomed articulation stumbles bles and give him a clearly and slowly enunciated sample sampie of the right sound to be used it if it were noted for example that little billy could say kitty but when la in the habit of saying twitchen itchen th for kitchen his mother you would expect would several times pronounce the word kitchen distinctly using such sentences afterwards as 11 kitty t Is in the kitchen this would give billy an association of sounds bounds to guide him she would never ask him not to say th itchen but it would probably be noticeable that in a few days he would drop the faulty pronunciation if instead this mother should do a good deal of talking about th itch en being wrong or should repeat the pronunciation la in the form of baby talk the error would be more and more deeply engraved on his mind and it would be correspondingly difficult for him to drop the incorrect syllable similarly it Is often wiser not to take much notice of un undesirable desIra ble echo words which the children pick up from others but instead of that to set the right copy and exam pie in hi wholesome language and conversation and in kindly mental attitudes A wise man said 1 I am the sum total of all I 1 have ever met our characters are made up of our reactions to the influences with which we have made contact so it Is very important and vital that the th e best examples and the best influx influences ances be given our children in order that these may far outweigh those less desirable ones which they will inevitably evit ably meet A business man speaks of 0 losses as represented by figures in the red baby talk and faulty conduct copy belong in the red |