In this tools post I give you strategies to use with your child for the purpose of stimulating early vocabulary development. Most of your child’s early vocabulary will consist of naming words. These words help your child make sense of the physical environment and get ready to make basic requests. Being able to express needs by asking for basic things is an essential skill. It is also importa ...[Read More]
Tools: Stimulating Early Vocabulary Development
Tools: Help Your Young Child Develop Number Sense
Number sense involves more than just counting. It requires understanding quantities and comparison concepts like more/less, larger/smaller. Your child only gradually acquires these skills through the preschool years. (See my article, Is Math and Number Sense a Language Skill?) But you can start very early to lay a foundation for your child developing number sense. Lay a Foundation for Number Sense ...[Read More]
Tools: Using Form Puzzles to Stimulate Word Imitation
Imitation of sounds and words is an essential step in learning to talk. If your child is late in talking or has speech that is unintelligible, you will find this activity helpful. Most two and three year olds love form puzzles. These are the wooden puzzles in which each removable piece represents a complete, easily recognizable object. Even some children as young as 18 months like them, as do some ...[Read More]
Learning the Speech Sounds
Your baby’s babbling consists of strings of consonant-like sounds alternating with an ah-like vowel sound. While these sounds resemble speech sounds, they are not “phonemes.” The baby is simply vocalizing while opening and closing its mouth. When you imitate your baby’s babbling sounds, you set the stage for baby to imitate your sounds. You match the baby’s sounds, and the baby in turn match ...[Read More]
Learning Words–Early Stages of Vocabulary Development
You have probably read some of those little “pointing” books with your baby. You know, those books with hard pages and a single object pictured on each page. You point to the picture and name the object. Pretty soon, your baby points to each picture as you turn the page and might even try to imitate the word. This is a great way to stimulate your child’s early speech development and teach some bas ...[Read More]
First Steps in Learning to Talk
Your child’s speech development starts long before he or she says the first word. In fact, some research indicates that a baby learns to recognize the mother’s voice already while in the womb. At just a few months old, babies will distinguish between the language of their environment and a foreign language. Studies showing this did not include a familiar voice, just the familiar language contraste ...[Read More]
Does My Child Have Autism?
Autism is certainly one of the things parents worry about when their child’s speech is not developing as expected. And it is true that late speech and language development is one of the signs of autism. But only a small percentage of late talkers actually are on the autism spectrum. Autism is a communication disorder, a social disorder. Speech is a tool through which humans communicate with each ...[Read More]
Shouldn’t My Child Be Talking By Now?
If you are concerned about your child not yet talking, first ask yourself what your expectations are based on. Are you comparing with an older sibling, or perhaps your neighbor’s child across the street? Children do develop different skills at different rates. There is always the chance that your expectations are based on a child who was particularly precocious in talking. So when should your chil ...[Read More]
Is My Child’s Speech Regressing?
Parents often express concern that their child’s speech is becoming less clear. They wonder, “Is my child regressing?” There are factors that can cause speech regression, but what you are observing might not be regression at all. It could just be a normal stage in your child’s speech development. Let’s sort out the different possibilities. Normal Causes of Apparent Speech R ...[Read More]
Does My Child Have A Speech Problem?
If you are concerned that your child might have a speech problem, your child is probably talking some. But perhaps speech is not clear, even hard to understand. Most parents and teachers, think of a “speech problem” as not pronouncing words right, not using all the sounds. But speech problems can involve much more than speech sounds. Perhaps your child is just not learning words as fas ...[Read More]