Ming (Agents of Speech) advises caregivers of ~18-month-old children that many are not yet ready to talk and recommends focusing on pre-linguistic, social-prerequisite skills instead. Key suggestions: teach the child to play and have fun with the caregiver, build sociable routines (singing with actions, tickling, swinging, toy play), and strengthen social connection to make later language learning easier.
And then think about what kind of things can you teach other than language? Because Most probably at 18 months, I don't think your child is ready to actually talk yet. There are loads of skills that we call prerequisites, pre linguistic skills that involve, like, matching skills and whatnot. The point should be, can you teach your child to play with you? Can you teach your child to have fun with you? Can you teach your child to do some actions while singing some songs, whilst playing some toys, whilst creating a routine that is sociable, like tickling, like jumping around, like swinging them around? Those routines will actually create a better social connection between you and your kid. It's going to be much easier for you to tackle the talking part when he or she is ready. At this point in time, you're 18 months old, is not ready to talk. If they're not talking already.
