Kids learn by playing and using their imagination. So when your child asks, “play with me”, get on the ground, have some fun, and make that eye contact. There is nothing more rewarding than to connect with your child through the medium of play. One you have established the child’s attention during play, try the following activities:
1. Take turns making speech sounds, like /G, K, T, D, S, L, CH, SH, eR/. You make a sound and have your child say it back. There is no right or wrong here, just play with the sounds.
2. Make up fun stories with the toys you are playing with. Project concepts like “go/stop, up/down, in/out” onto the toys. Say these words out loud as the toy/object performs that concept.
3. Ask the toys questions. Focus on the “WH” questions, like “who, what, where, when, why”. Use lots of facial expressions and hand gestures when asking questions to cue the child that you want an answer in return. When children start answering questions, their vocabulary grows and their sentence length expands.
As you can see, speech and language development can be a fun process. Get on the child’s level, have fun, and make eye contact. You’ll be amazed at what you get in return !
For more information about speech therapy services in Tucson, please contact me here.
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I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW IF THERE IS ANY PLAY GROUPS FOR KIDS THAT HAS SPEECH DELAYS HERE IN TUCSON.