#1 Not Anticipating Needs or Desires

Do not anticipate your child’s every need or desire before they have a chance to make them known to you. If your child gets what he wants without communicating for it, he/she will not bother to point, gesture, or possibly ask.

This also includes getting the cooperation of any older brother or sister to not talk for your child. An older brother or sister can often greatly help or hurt your speech and language stimulation efforts in many areas.

Examples:

• When your child is not looking, place a favourite toy or doll up high where they can’t reach it but can see it. They will have to communicate by pointing or gesturing that he/she wants the toy or doll.
• When the family sits down for a meal, and everyone has a spoon except for your child, he/she will have to communicate by pointing or gesturing that they want a spoon too.
• If you put on only one of your child’s shoes and act as if you are finished, they will have to communicate by pointing or gesturing that you forgot to put on the other shoe.

#2 Delaying Responses to Gestures

Delay your responses to your child’s pointing, gestures or babbling when he/she wants things. When your child points or gestures without attempting to talk, he is still trying to communicate, and you eventually have to respond to this non-verbal communication. However, just pretend you don’t understand what he/she wants for 15-20 seconds and then respond appropriately.

If he/she attempts to say meaningful word(s), you would respond to your child right away. Show your child that the payoff for attempting to use words is much greater- things happen faster.


Example:

• When your child points to a bottle of juice on the counter, you might say “I’m not sure. Do you want a spoon? (pause) Your teddy? (pause). Finally you might say, “Some juice? Oh you want juice.” Then as you hand your child the cup of juice, you might add “juice”. But don’t ask him/her or expect him/her to say the word juice right then.

#3 Parent’s Speech

Labeling: Name nouns (objects) and verbs (actions) in real life and in pictures. Give your child a chance to respond; wait for a second or two after saying a word; but don’t ask or expect him to do so right away.

Use slow, clear, simple speech when talking to your child. By the age of one, never talk baby-talk to your child. Even when they mispronounce a word in a “cute” way, rather than say it back to him/her exactly as they said it, pronounce the word back to them correctly and then maybe use it in a phrase or short sentence

Example:

If your child says “wa-wa” for water, don’t tell him/her, “wa-wa- yes- drink wa-wa.” Instead, you might say, “water- yes- drink water.”

Always try to make your child feel good about making the effort to speak. However, if you don’t understand what they are saying, don’t pretend to understand. You need to be honest and let him/her know you didn’t understand what he just said.

After your child finishes telling you a completely unintelligible, sentence-like utterance, you might say, “You talked. I like that. But I don’t know what you said,” and possibly shrug your shoulders with a blank look.

#4 Using Prompts

A prompt is a hint, instruction or any information that will help your child learn to take a better turn. Before any prompt make sure to pause and wait to give your child time to take a turn. If your child does nothing over a period of time then you can help him learn to do it better by giving a prompt. This prompt may help your child to progress:

• From a random movement to a recognizable gesture
• From something he understands but never imitated to imitated
• From random sounds to sounds that are closer to real word
• From words to phrases
• From incorrect grammar to the correct form

• Point or hold the milk close to your mouth as you say “milk”. This helps your child focus on what you are saying.

• Emphasize an easy sound in the word “mmmmilk”
• Use your fingers to shape your child’s lips into the “m” position

• Describe milk. For example, “Look its white…it’s not juice, its m-…”

#5 Reading Books

Choose colourful books with large, simple pictures. How you read to a one or two year old is different than how you read to a three or four year old. Make up your own simple version or sing a phrase or short sentence for each picture. Point out the action in the picture and the things you talk about.

Also remember that a young child’s attention span is much shorter than that of an older child’s. So you have to keep turning the pages at a faster rate when “reading” to a very young child if you want to hold their attention to the book.

Example:

• Rather than read the words printed below a picture to your child, you might say, “girl happy” or “boy sick”. You would say only one of these possible phrases and then continue to the next page of the book.

#6 Self-Talk

Talk out-loud about what you are seeing, hearing, doing, or feeling when your child is nearby or within hearing distance. He/she does not have to be close to you or pay attention to you when you talk out-loud; he only has to be within hearing range. Be sure to use slow, clear, simple words and short phrases.

Example:

• When you are washing the dishes, and your child is playing with toys on the kitchen floor you might say, “hot water- pick up cup- dirty cup- wash- wash-wash the cup- the cup is clean- pick up plate… etc.”
• When you are putting up a picture on the wall, and your child is playing in the corner of the room, you might say, “hammer—hammer pounds- pound nail- pound- put hammer down- pick up picture- picture on wall”.
• When you are outside pulling weeds in the yard, and your child is nearby playing in the grass, you might say, “looking- looking for weeds- see a weed- bend down- grab the weed- pill weed-“

#7 Parallel Talk

Talk out-loud about what is happening to your child. Use words that describe what he/she is doing, seeing, hearing or feeling when your child is nearby or within hearing range. Again, your child does not have to be close to you or pay attention to you when you talk out-loud; he only has to be within hearing range. Be sure to use slow, clear, simple words and short phrases.

Example:

• When you and your child are outside and he/she falls down in the dirt while running around, you might say, “fall down- Billy gets up- dirty hands- clean up hands”
• When your child is playing with a doll on the floor you might say, “See doll- pick up doll- play with doll.”

#8 Reinforcement

Respond quickly to your child’s speech attempts and verbal requests by your actions and/or verbal responses.

Your non-verbal praise can include a smile, a hug, a pat on the back, clapping your hands, etc.

Your verbal praise can include modeling back to your child what he/she said or just letting them know you like what they said.

Example:

• When you are playing with your child and he/she says “ba” for ball the first time, you might open your eyes wide, smile and then say “ball- ball rolls- I like your talking.”
• When you’re cooking soup on the stove and your child comes up behind you and says “hot”, you might turn and pat him/her on the back while you say, “hot pan!- you talked- mama’s happy.”

#9 Expanding to Your Child’s Words

As a general rule, add one or two words to what your child says when you respond back to him/her. A child loves to hear his own words repeated back to him/her! Also, our child’s word order may be different than yours. Let him/her hear the right word order; and correct the basic grammar if necessary. Don’t worry about using perfect grammar yourself or being a perfect model. Just follow the general rules above.

Examples:

• Change “up” to “come up”
• Change “baby” to “baby cry”
• Change “mine” to “this is mine”
• Change “shoe” to “take off shoe”

• Change “me sock” to “put on socks”
• Change “open door” to “open up the door”
• Change “no want” to “I don’t want it”
• Change “me go” to “I want to go”

• Change “look man walk” to “look at the man walking”
• Change “no eat pie” to “I didn’t eat the pie”
• Change “we play doll” to “let’s play with the doll”

Adapted From “Help Me Talk”
Philip Eichten

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Tags: Language, Speech, Development, Literacy, Tips