A children's speech and language is urging parents to do one thing when reading to their toddlers to help with speech and vocabulary. Between the ages of nine and 12 months, a baby begins to understand commonly used words such as ‘mummy' and 'daddy', depending on which words they hear most often. But from one year onwards, they should start stringing sounds and even words or sentences together. The NHS recommends reading to babies from an early age, even from birth to boost brain development,