Language is the medium through which children express their identities, make sense of the world, and participate in learning. It is not simply a collection of words but a dynamic, social process that shapes thought and experience. As Krishna Kumar (2006) notes in The Child’s Language and the Teacher, classrooms often restrict children’s talk to impersonal or predetermined exchanges, which risks silencing their natural curiosity and voice. In this article, I want to explore why talk matters in education, drawing not only on Kumar’s work but also on insights from other scholars of children’s language development, while reflecting on everyday classroom experiences.

In his opening chapter, Kumar asks a fundamental question: What is language? He reminds us that language is not merely a formal

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