Children often understand more than they can speak!
Long before a child can speak, her or she is listening closely to what is going on, and understanding far more than we would think.
During infancy, babies and caretakers communicate through facial expressions and gestures and sounds. Children initially may gather meaning through your tone of voice, inflection, gestures, and facial expressions. They mainly communicate through feelings that are innate from the beginning.
However, it is amazing how quickly very young children understand the meaning of words themselves. From the first words they hear, children are developing their vocabulary and a child's ability to understand words far outstrips her ability to speak words.
One reason it makes good sense to talk a lot with very young children is that they are learning words and meanings with everything they hear. Most people have seen this in action when a child picks up a named toy or follows verbal instructions before they are able to speak the words.
And this learning and vocabulary building continues throughout their growing lives. As children get older, they learn between 2000-5000 words a year!
This is why we feel that the words in music that children and families listen to are important. If music is a part of your lives, they are hearing what is being said! Kids can understand the lyrics of more complex songs, and we would like those words to be something meaningful and thoughtful.
Music is a great expression of feelings, which children have from the beginning, and words, which they are gathering and learning from all the time.