I’ve heard it a thousand times, “All they do is play, they’re not learning anything!”…but that ‘play’, well, it is a child’s work! Did you know you can arrange the environment that your child plays in to increase their communication skills?! There are ways you can systematically increase your child’s communication?!
As a former special education teacher and behavior analyst, one of my many roles, was to increase social communication. This looked very different for the range of abilities and ages of kiddos I worked with, but, if there was one thing that I had LOTS of practice with, it was arranging environments to increase communication. Throughout my career, I worked in a variety of settings including the home, private clinic, office buildings, resource room, inclusion setting and general classroom.
I have since then turned in my professional hat for a mommy hat and now get to put all of my research and experience to use with my own two peanuts. Our house is now inundated with massive amounts of colorful, loud and multi-part toys…times two with our twin toddlers!
Here are some simple steps you can take to increase those communication skills in your own home!
- Identify your child’s most preferred items. This is a pretty easy one…just sit back and watch! What is your child most drawn to? How long do they interact with it? What do they constantly carry around? Take note that this may change on a day to day or even hour to hour basis. Also remember what was super exciting at the beginning of the day will probably not be as exciting after they have played with it for 30 minutes.
- Put those most preferred toys up high. I know this seems kind of counter intuitive because your wee ones are…wee. This is so so important though! When we’re talking communication, we want to maximize the number of opportunities we’re providing to get them talking! If the toys are always at your child’s level, they have access to them and won’t have to communicate with you to get what they want!
- Be a giver, not a taker. This is huge… try to be in control of your child’s most preferred toys so that you are able to deliver the super-cool, motivating toys {therefore, making yourself super cool! – not that you aren’t the coolest mom ever, though, right?!}. Try to create natural opportunities to regain control after a bit so they have to ask for it again!
- Get on your child’s level. You want to be able to model speech sounds, sign language, or mouth movements so that your child can actually see. Make sure they are paying attention to you and your face (or hands) are clearly visible.
- Wait. This is a tough one, but oh-so important!! Model and then wait. Give your child time to respond.
- Reinforce. Again, this seems easy, but so often I have seen parents or caregivers get busy and forget to deliver that super cool toy, or wait too long. Try to reinforce immediately (think 1-3 seconds)!
- Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Babies, toddlers and kids LOVE to repeat fun things over and over again (and remember, you’re having a blast?!) which also increases the opportunities they have to be successful!!
- Have fun! Kids love enthusiasm..so get in character, be silly, make noises and faces, sing and have fun!!
Question: What have you done with your child to increase communication skills?
