Encouraging spontaneous communication
- To develop joint attention and turn taking skills, cover your child’s face and say “where’s Bobby?” Exclaim “peek-a boo!” when you see his face. Cover your head with the blanket. Encourage your child to pull it off your head and say “peek-a-boo!” Play hide and seek to encourage “calling”.
- Place toys on shelving, book cases, and cabinets, out of the child’s reach. Your child will have to request the toy instead of independently retrieve it. When he wants to play with a favorite toy, he must indicate this by pointing, saying, or signing “play.”
- At meal and snack time, provide your child with two choices to eat or drink. Model the request “I want__.” Any verbal attempt is praised. Instead of giving a bowl of cheerios, just give him 2 at a time. When he is finished, he is expected to indicate more.
- To develop imitation skills and learn body parts, sit with your child on your lap in front of the mirror. Make silly sounds and faces in the mirror. Find your nose, mouth, eye, and ears. When your child says or does something, imitate it immediately. Play a Simon says game in the mirror. Raise hands, clap hands, tap mirror. Imitate whatever your child does and pair it with a word.
- Label everything you child touches and does. Use short repetitive phrases such as, “you’re pouring water.” Contrast opposites such as hot/cold, wet/dry, clean/dirty.” Parents can narrate what they are doing or seeing while they are with their children.
- Engineer the environment to foster commenting. Put only one sock and shoe on the child and proceed to go outside, the wrong puzzle piece, a closed container with a desired item that that he cannot open, and ask them to say “help me.”
- Hold a toy under your chin when you say a word. The action gives the child a view of your mouth. Ask them to repeat the word back to you.
- When blowing bubbles or rolling a ball back and forth, model: “ready, set, go” or “1, 2, 3” “mine” or “ba”. Wait for your child to request “more.” Let the child blow a few bubbles. Then give her a bubble want without any liquid.
- Sing your child’s favorite song (i.e., Old Mc Donald) and leave out the last word to see if you child will finish the phrase.
- Keep your words just above the level that they are communicating on. If they are using single words, use two words to communicate. If they are not using words, use just one or at the most two to communicate.
- To develop turn-taking skills, take turns stacking blocks, playing puzzles, pop up toys, and say my turn and your turn. If your child doesn’t take a turn, say, “whose turn?”
- To develop cause-effect relationship and the desire to communicate, lift your child up with your feet while laying down. Repeat the word When your child is begging for more, look at her expectantly and “Up? Tell mommy up.”
- Initiate a favorite physical activity then suddenly stop, look at the child, and wait.
- Blow up a balloon and let it deflate. Then hold it up to your mouth and wait.
- Stand at the door without opening it. Hide toys under cups or boxes. Lift up one at a time, and look surprised as you peek in and label the toys.
- View masters and looking through paper towel tubes are great for commenting what you see.
- Walk into the room with a shoe on your head, or something unusual.
- Look at a flip up book and comment on the pictures. Repeat with the same book, but only point.
- Pretend a doll is sleeping. Vocalize “wake up!’ Repeat a few times, then put the doll to sleep, wait and do nothing.
- To encourage “greeting”, knock on the table as you say hello and bring out toy animals one at a time. Have the animal “greet” the child. Say goodbye to each animal as you put it away.
- Shake a paper bag and say “What’s inside?” Take familiar items out, one at a time, having the child name them. Then take out an unfamiliar object.
- To foster eye contact, tap your child’s nose and then your own nose. After the child looks, reward him/her and say “Good looking!”
- To encourage joint attention, hold up a favorite item and say, “look.” When your child looks, reward by giving the toy to your child.
- When asking questions and your child does not respond, provide choices. “What is this?” “Is it a ball or truck?
- Pretend play is an important part of a child’s development. Pretend to pour juice, give the doll a drink, feed the doll, stir soup, or talk on a play phone. Pair your actions with sounds or words! For example, push the car and say “vroom,” tap a drum, say “boom-boom”. Here are sounds you can model while playing: choo-choo, beep-beep, honk-honk, tick tock, ring-ring, mmm-mmm.
- To develop choice making and eye contact, empty a puzzle Place two puzzle pieces near your face and ask her which one she wants: “Do you want the boat or the dog?”
- If your child has difficulty imitating 2 syllable words, try to babble the last syllable for them. For example, “Open→”O pa pa pa” “All done→all da da da” “water→wa wa wa.”