Do any of you have kids who have made up their own language? My DS4 has begun to talk in nonsense words. At first, I thought he was mimicking baby talk, but he told me it's an alien language from the planet Ziberton. He'll murmur to himself in this language while he's coloring, drawing or playing with legos. I've also heard "Zibertonian" come out of the mouth of his best friend from preschool, so he seems to be infecting others.

Yes! DS4 has a language he calls "his name language." (So if his name were Fred, he'd call it "Fred Language.")

He makes up words and tries to really use them. He's even got some basic rules of pronunciation/spelling and how to decide what to name things. His brother plays along, and they'll sometimes use words from "DS4 Language" to converse. I think it's hilarious!

Are you worried about it or amused?

LOL! My sister used to do this all the time - especially in public. It drove our parents batty. Ah the memories...
Sounds like a very active imagination. Wonderful! :-)

Our DS3 doesn't make up his own language but does talk in a rhyming/pig latin type of language. This was *before* we got Runny Babbit by Shel Silverstein. There we go encouraging our kids again

JB

I'm mostly amused, I guess, although it can be frustrating when he occasionally lapses into gibberish in front of kids or adults who don't know him well. They could easily mistake him for being slow rather than advanced, and I do see this as an extension of his advanced language skills. He's a sponge for language and has loved word play since he was 2. The other night, we read a chapter in Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator where Willie Wonka talks in a nonsense alien language, and I swear I saw my son swoon. This was weeks after my son started his own language, and he thought it was the greatest thing ever. It gave me a new appreciation for Roald Dahl.

Have you introduced him to codes and ciphers? He might really enjoy simple ones, even at age 4. And maybe it's time to start teaching a foreign language. I keep thinking that about DS4...

Yeah, all this is making me more and more anxious for him to start a foreign language. He'll formally start Spanish when he starts kindergarten in the fall, but I'm thinking maybe I should start with the basics now.

MY DS6 language is Yubbanese. Derived from the planet Yubba which he will discover when he grows up and is an Astronomer.

It's nice that he knows the language already. That's very convenient!

Some of my friends at rio rancho mid-high have made a new language called "carnie". I not sure how to speak it that good.
I know that I is Ezi and Hippo would be Hezipezo. I think it's perfectly normal for gifted kids like myself to create languages.

DS4 does that from time to time, he used to do it more several months ago. Sometimes he will make up words and instist that they are words, sometimes he will make up a word and then tell me "that means _________ in Spanish" I minored in spanish so I can usually tell when he is making stuff up. Lately he is into making up expressions and insisting they are expressions. He was sick this weekend and said to me "mom I am really topped" Apparently that means that he is really exhausted and not feeling well. He makes expressions up all the time, but he generally doesn't use them more than once so I never know what he is talking about. He always insists "It's just an expression mom." He has made up some interesting expressions. Who knows....maybe I will hear others saying them eventually. And also, my DS really enjoys foreign languages and knows quite a bit of Spanish. That can be really fun with kids like this. Or introducing a word a day.

One of my college students once wrote "To coin a cliche'..." which I found hilarious, but maybe that's what your DS4 is really doing, Shelly!

LOL!

We get this too, but the language is a made-up one related to DS5's imaginary world "that means ______ in gork language" or something like that. DS5 is also big into making up his own magic spells � la Harry Potter, so we get a lot of fun made-up words there (a favorite spell is buttafloorus).

We recently went to the speech therapist on referral from the school district. As DS demonstrated his spells and told her a bunch of stories about his made-up world, the speech therapist smiled and took notes. Turns out his speech is fine for his age, but his age appropriate missing "r" is made more troublesome by his extensive and unexpected vocabulary and his made-up language.

DS6 used to to do this as well, speak with his invisible friend

LOL Kriston, yes that must be it. My favorite part is that he acts as if when he uses one of his "expressions" that I should know exactly what it means. They way in which he says "it's an expression mom" when I ask him about it...kind of like "duh!" cracks me up every time. I have explained to him that expressions are generally said by more than one person, but he insists that if it makes sense to him, it can be an expression LOL. He was sick this weekend and here was a conversation we had as he was laying in bed at night with a fever, in a semi-lucid state : (

DS: Boy mom, I am just topped

Me: Huh, I don't know what that means

DS: I don't know what it means either but you know the highest you can get, like the very top of something...that's how I feel...like I can't go any higher

Me: So you mean you are feeling pretty sick and tired?

DS: Yes, that's what I mean.

That is too funny. My DD4 does the exact same thing. She insists she knows Spanish. She makes up little expressions all the time. Today it's "whacker". She just said to her brother "That's hilarious, you little whacker" among it's 20 other uses today. Whatever that means.

Love these! So funny!

Hi, Sean, welcome! This language sounds very fun, easy-peazy is what I thought when I read Hezipezo...

great stories from all, very interesting! I was thinking the same thing Kriston - sounds like kids crying out for a foreign language, or introduction to the enigma code...hm.

I wonder if he would take to the real gibberish, someone taught it to me a long time ago and I found it very helpful when wanting to talk to someone in private when the room was full of people.
the rules of gibberish are simple to learn and with pratice a gifted person should be speaking an entire new language within weeks.
it's all about manipulating the sounds of the word rather saying it how it "looks" if written down.
cat = at-ce pronounced at-key the sounds of the original word are preserved but the letters before the first vowel in the word are put to the end of the word and a vowel is placed behind it
string = ing-stre
it makes it fun when you come to worlds like refridgerator where you can break it up into the sylables (sp)
(e-re idge-fre ator-re)
the joy of this language is that most people simply can't understand it when it's spoken fluently.

Just a thought anyways,,, worked well for me.