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Another question, about toddlers. Does anyone have advice on how to count a toddler's vocabulary.

Two weeks ago, I started writing a list, but stopped at 200 and couldn't keep up with all DD's phrases. I thought she might be at 300, but now I think it's more like 900-1000. She just knows every word.

Anybody even try to write them down or otherwise capture them?

After about 18 months, I quit at "knows hundreds of words." I didn't see any point in continuing the count!

Great question, funny question.

Great because - I have wondered off an on over the years how "official" counts are made by the developmental experts. (for a change, I was only moderately curious and never did any further investigating)

Funny because -

I forget how old my ds was... I really can't remember! But there was a certain point where I just gave up counting. I had a notebook and I would write down all the words he knew and knew well. Every couple of days/weeks I would count them up. One day I said to my mother , do you know how many words he knows now? And her reply was something like: a lot/more than you can write? And that's when I stopped trying to count.

EW

No. Not with a GT kid. We did what you did for a while, but both our kids' vocabularies were just booming too fast to keep up.

And really, why bother? The reason for counting is to be sure the child isn't delayed, right? Well, that doesn't seem to be a problem!

I kept a pregnancy diary, and once DS5 arrived I just kept on writing, so I have a pretty complete record of his development and interests (which is already fun, and which I anticipate passing on to him some day!). It was natural to write down words we heard, to start with. Once he was really beginning to talk I started a real list, but I stopped it once I got to 100 words, i.e. I was only actually keeping a list for a few weeks. I suppose it would have been interesting to see what order he learned words in even after that, but it was already clear I was missing things and the effort didn't seem worthwhile! I did continue to write down the odd utterance verbatim.

Hey sea-blue,

Wow! I reckon I would give up counting by now too. Have you got a developmental milestone checklist? Before we did testing, the pysch asked us to complete a background/developmental history questionnaire. They asked all sorts of questions that I couldn't fill in. Instead of continuing to count, why not check that you're keeping a record of other key milestones that might help when/if you decide to do a formal evaluation. I've still got a copy of the questionnaire that my psych used if you want me to email it to you... jojo

ps. sounds like you've got one bright cookie!

I just found your site and this is my first post. I am trying to learn everything I can about gifted kids so I can figure out if my dd is gifted. She seems to be very high functioning verbally. She just turned 2 and talks in grammatically correct complete sentences. She started with short sentences at 17 months and is now at the point where she can say anything with the correct pronoun, tense, etc. I know that this is above average but is it considered gifted? She also seems much older than her age in other ways but the talking is her biggest strength.

We kept track of our daughter's first words. I had a website all about her for the first year (for relatives far away) and I would update that every so often with her new words. Their languages develops so quickly, so we didn't bother keeping track of her new words for very long. We did, however, keep track of her signs and made a note when she learned knew ones (this was only in the first year since she doesn't use them anymore). I found it useful to keep track so that when I left her with her grandparents I could remember to tell them her new signs so that they could understand her! I used to email them lists of the sings she new...wow I must have been an annoying new mom! lol

jojo, what sort of milestones are on the list? i don't keep track of anything! I guess maybe I should...one day she might ask me when she learned to walk up stairs etc. I will definitely be able to tell her that she started sleeping through the night 2 weeks before her second birthday! I won't forget that milestone (well maybe that isn't a developmental milestone (?), but it is definitely a huge milestone in this house!!!!)!

Hey, thanks everyone for your responses. It was such a dumb question I was afraid no one would respond!

I took DD to her ped yesterday for bronchitis and mentioned that she now has 200-300 words. Her ped said, "Wow, she's 22 months old... I look for 50 words at 24 months." That drove me to some lists of giftedness and some of normal language development. It looked like DD was at the 48 month mark in most language areas, so then I started wondering if I'm crazy or if she really does have a vocabulary of 900-1000 words.

Here's one site:

http://www.childdevelopmentinfo.com/development/language_development.shtml

Jojo, I'd love to see your lists!

Ruf's list was confusing for me, I might have to purchase the book. DD is much earlier on some points (attention span of 60+ mins at 10 months), but later with other stuff (she doesn't know her colors, everything is "blue").

Anyway, I'm definitely not going to do any more note taking on her words. She's been saying motorcycle and helicopter for months now, in context, and pomegranate seeds. You name it. Last week she said to DH "Put down wine and make me a bath?" LOL! When she uses pronouns she does so correctly, (I say, "I'll go get you Lizard," and she responds, "You'll get me Lizard.") although she doesn't always choose to use them.

Interesting list; my dd2.5 is way up there too at least according to this list. I wasn't quite sure what this part meant though: "Has number concepts of 4 or more" - what do you think?
I guess this is diff. than counting, because later in the list they say 'counts to 10'.

DD has been following this pattern so far for absorbing these different areas - numbers, colors, letters:
1. all numbers or colors are the same.
2. using diff. number names but mixing them all up, halfway seems like she's joking around.
3. knows numbers up to 5 very solid, knows 2-3 colors.
now she can count to 10++, and call out colors beyond the basic 3 primary and b&w. Still a bit iffy on id'ing numbers when written over say #4. Can count backwards from 5 to 1.
(Couple of months back started asking about tomorrow, yesterday...what are we doing Friday. Last week she asked me if I was going to make a left turn; I almost ran into a lamp post. Probably she was just repeating something I'd said myself...)

Numbers were first, then colors, now she seems to be working on letters. She started in on the mixing them all up phase, trying to match them or making funny juxtapositions when looking at an alphabet book.
Maybe in another 6-8 months she'll be id'ing them correctly more often than not, but I don't want to go too overboard with pressing her. Just enjoying the phases; it's odd they are so clear!