Quick tips to get your child talking at home

Whether your child has yet to utter their first words, or they are well on their way to putting two words together, here are some tips to help support your child’s language development!

Imitating Actions. 

A precursor to imitating language consistently is imitating actions.  If your child is not yet talking, they can still learn how to begin imitating non-verbally! You can introduce this through songs with gestures (Wheels on the Bus, Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes), games (Peek-a-Boo), and general actions like clapping or stomping. At the start, if your child needs help, use hand-over-hand to teach the action.

Withholding.

This can be a great technique to teach a child to use language! We often anticipate the needs of a child making it less necessary for them to use language to have their wants/needs met. Withholding objects/actions will give the child an opportunity to use a gesture, word approximation, or word and, show them the value of language and communication! The object/action can be withheld until the child imitates (or attempts) the target word or uses simple signs (like, “more”) to request them.  It is important to provide a verbal model for the child, especially when introducing new vocabulary.

Use routine play schemas.  

As a child grows accustomed to the same play routines and language, they will start to “fill-in-the-blank” and use the associated language independently.  It is great to use the same language repetitively while modeling actions during familiar, routine play ideas such as a ball maze, cutting pretend foods and pretending to eat, putting items in a dump truck and dumping it out, etc.  For example, while playing with stacking cups: “more cup”, “go up”, “more please”,  “my turn”, “blue cup”, “ready, set, go”, “boom”, and “fall down”.

Get on their level. 

When you’re interacting with a child, it is best to give them a full view of you, especially your face.  Young children are often playing down on the floor.  When possible, get down there with them! It’s important to make eye contact, and let them see your mouth as you are talking, and let them see your expressions.  When reading a book with your child, try sitting them in front of you instead of on your lap!

Talk about what you’re doing.

Use single words or simple two-word phrases to talk about objects and actions. For instance, use “shoe on” as opposed to “Let’s put your shoe on your foot now”.   This will help your child to understand and pick up language more easily.

Encourage language by acknowledging and reinforcing your child’s speech attempts.

Sometimes a child is trying to tell us something, but we aren’t quite sure what it is.  It’s best to go with what you “think” the child intended, or take a guess based on the context.  This is important because it reinforces the child’s attempt to communicate.