Investigated whether sustained forms of nonverbal coordinated action facilitates toddlers' generation of verbal discourse with one another. Twenty-four 2-year-olds interacted with an adult, in 2 nonverbal interactive contexts: an imitation game and parallel play. Found that involvement in nonverbal imitation games facilitated toddlers responding verbally to adult speech in a topically well-connected way and maintaining responses over successive turns. (JPB)