Teaching names to the child who calls every male "daddy" and every female "mommy"

[Anonymous]

How do I do this?

[Anonymous]

Just keep repeating "That's Uncle Michael, that's Jenny our neighbor" and eventually the kid will catch on. I am assuming the child in question is a toddler and not like 12, which would be a real issue.

[Anonymous]

How old is your kid? Mine was calling every man "dada" and every woman "mama" for a while when she was 15 months. I just kept repeating "no, that's not dada, that's (Dr. Smith, Bob, a man)." Over and over, and then one day it clicked.

[Anonymous]

Almost 2 years old, I tried assigning names randomly to strangers like Bob, Cece, and Joe but DC is still calling strangers Mommy and Daddy.

[Anonymous]

This is a very common stage. Kids generalize concepts.

Just keep using the correct names.

For example:
"mommy!"
"you see grandma! Let's go play with grandma"

[Anonymous]

Funny - I have twin toddlers (almost 2). Every male is a "daddy" when they are a stranger but I am the only person they call mommy. They are also getting really great at calling people by names but this is relatively new. Like PP said, just keep introducing people by name. They really do want to label everything.

[Anonymous]

Why? It's cute. They'll figure it out. My daughter would say, "That daddy is running!" "Is that daddy going in the car?" Her word for man was "daddy" and frankly I loved it. I also loved picking her up at daycare and hearing all the toddlers tell her that "mommy" was here and hearing her say, "That's MY mommy!"

[Anonymous]

Once when my oldest was a toddler we were in the grocery store and she pointed excitedly at the box of Uncle Ben's rice and called Uncle Ben "Daddy!"

My DH is white.

They grow out of this stage.

[Anonymous]

My 2yo does this. He doesn't think they are his mommy and daddy. He sees a man and says, "it's a daddy!" I've explained that he might not be but it doesn't bother me.

[Anonymous]

Point out the pictures of people around your house and teach/review everyone's names.

[Anonymous]

I let my 21-month old watch some of the Olympics, and he pointed to the women's basketball and said "Mommy ball!" He knows the names of his teachers and his friends, so I think he'll get it eventually.

[Anonymous]

My 2 year old does the same thing. I think now that he gets it but still does it because he thinks it's funny because we laugh whenever he points to a random man and says "Daddy" even if his Daddy is standing right next to him.

[Anonymous]

This perfectly normal and your kid will figure it out, just keep correcting them. Btw, the thing that annoys me is when random strangers respond to "daddy" by looking at me like I am some slut whose kid does not know her father.