Lots of grunting, not too much talking

One of my boys (16 months old), grunts A LOT. I've done signs with them since they were around five months old, but they have never really taken to them and instead went right to words. But recently one of my boys seems to be grunting a lot more than before, even for words he used to know. I suspect this is probably normal, and I'm not too worried about it.

However, it is causing problems with my less-than-patient father and I am not sure how to handle the situation in a way that will stand up for my son but also diffuse the tension. My father comes over every other day or so, and my son loves for him to read to him from his favorite word book. There is no story line, just a bunch of photos of different things, and he especially loves the page entitled "things that go."
He likes to point at all the photos, grunt, and then get whoever is reading to him to tell him the name of the object. I'll admit it does get old sometimes, but my gut says there is no problem. He is just not ready to try and make those words yet, which is fine.
But my Dad gets really impatient with him, and keeps saying he needs to try and say the words, and his voices will keep getting louder and louder, "G say Tractor! It's a TRACTOR...!" That kind of thing. I step in and remind Dad that he's just a baby, but it does not seem to help. Usually I just go and get G from my Dad and get him involved in something else. But five minutes later he's trying to back over there with his book (he's REALLY obsessed with that book, lol). I don't like my Dad taking that angry, annoyed tone with my son, but I am not sure how to handle the situation besides just banning looking at the book when my Dad is around. Talking to my dad hasn't helped, and distracting G only works for a few minutes at most.If I put the book away he goes and finds another one, and we have many books all over the house.

Do I just ban all books when my father is around? That seems extreme. I don't know.

Any ideas? Anyone dealt with something similar?

I should mention that my father is 70, kind of grumpy and kind of always has been. He loves the boys very much, but he sometimes has a hard time showing it.

Also, this is normal right? All the grunting?

 

I think it's normal. At 16 months, mine certainly couldn't say tractor. The crazy thing is that they are learning to say tractor by reading that book repeatedly. They just aren't doing it yet! Mine had very few words and we were even a little concerned around 18 months. Then, between 18 months and 2, language just exploded, which I think is pretty normal. Suddenly, they could understand everything and try to repeat everything and spoke in short sentences. So I'd just try to impress upon your dad that G is learning to say tractor in his head. That's why he wants to hear the book. He's working it out and soon will be saying it out loud. Maybe if your dad gets that he IS helping language development, he'll be more understanding.

 

Mine are exactly like that and I think we have the same word book and they love it too. Can you joke with your dad and say something like "Dad, he'll say tractor, right after he learns to say grandpa, why don't you work on that with him. Also, he only talks when you feed him cookies so that might help"? Mine can say the word "ball" but when they are looking at books, we have to say it. I think it is just how they learn.

 

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll try talking to my Dad again. I love the idea of telling him that he'll learn to say tractor when he says grandpa! haha. He calls himself Pappa (we live in the south--lol), and they have yet to master the p sound. He will be so happy when they do!

Thanks again!