Daddy-daughter date night?

physics girl phd

My parents bought us this book:

The cartoon images of the naked people and sperm are fantastically funny. (If you image-google "where do I come from" you can get to blogs that discuss how this book gave the writer complexes and how the book is more from the man/sperm point of view... with more images from the book, but we always thought it was great.)

physics girl phd

As a mom to a now seven-month old, I talk to her both ways... and the baby-talk way DOES get a bigger smile. She knows it's a way of being playful (especially if it's being used in "peekaboo" games, which is useful if I'm disappearing out of sight briefly in the process of doing a household chore).

Brian_C

Oh brother, it's amazing how people can interpret things in a perverted manner.

GeorginaS

I wish I had the reference, but apparently it's not so much the baby talk that infants and young children respond to but the sing-song and higher-pitched tone of voice. You can speak perfectly normal words to them, but it's all about the tone that's comforting and appeals to them.

As to five-year-olds "knowing" about sex, they don't, or won't, even if you explained it to them explicitly. Which you don't need to. But there's no need to lie to them about where babies come from either. Point-blank age-appropriate information is good, as best I can tell. When they're young, they don't want an overwhelming amount of in-depth information anyway. Just give them the basics. They're good with that until more information becomes relevant to their world.

physics girl phd

That's what I call "baby talk." I guess sometimes I also do "mimicking" of her sounds, before saying real things too, just to acknowledge her (she was big into "gee" a few weeks ago, and now she's into "barr, barr, barr" and "ow-boo" with no "gee"s at all). I guess some parents might include some poor grammer and fake words in "baby talk"... but I don't.

Evo

That reminds me of the old story about the little girl that asked her father where she came from. The father went into a rather detailed talk about the birds and bees. Noticing that his dughter seemed a bit upset he finally stopped and asked her why she asked. She said "my friend Jenny said she was from Milwaukee, so I was wondering where I came from".

Zantra

Where babies come from: