Notes

Family Member 1 - First of all, I understand your frustration, my child didn't start speaking until he was 16 months. Even though your facts are correct, (Pg. 177), I have to respectfully disagree that stopping talking to your 14 month old child will force them to start talking. In-fact, stopping verbal communication with your child will significantly stunt their ability to speak and form words. There's no reason to be concerned, not all babies are the same. At around 25-26 months, children begin to have a large vocabulary spurt (Pg. 177), so please don't worry. Raising a child and teaching them to speak takes patience. There's a much better way to go about this, I would suggest continuing to speak to your child through positive reinforcement by smiling and touching them when your child makes a speech like sound, or even a coo. There is a study done by Dr. Goldstein of Cornell University that shows that infants whose mothers positively reinforced and made them feel positive when the babies made speech like noises actually had a positive impact on their child's ability to speak or form two letter babbles like noises such as "ba" or "guh" (Pg. 180), overall improving their ability to develop cognitive language skills. Overall, I really do understand where you're coming from but just remember, continue speaking with them and to be patient. I look forward to taking care of your child again soon, I believe in you and your child. 

Family Member 2 -