Early communication skills

Want to improve your child's communication and oral language skills by playing?

Simple steps for all parents!

1. Routine daily activities are the best opportunity to help a child learn to communicate and express themselves.
2. Talk to your child about what you do during the day and try to incorporate it wherever possible.
3. Try to find time in the day to spend playing with your child. Choose a time of day that is convenient for both you and the child. It is important to be rested and relaxed. By choosing the same time each day, such as after the child's nap, you create a pleasant routine in the child's daily routine that he or she will look forward to.
4. Two short play periods of 10-15 minutes may be more convenient than one continuous period of 30 minutes, where the very young child may lose interest.
5. Get down to the child's level so that he can see and hear you better.
6. Make sure you keep the toys you intend to play together separate from the ones he can access on his own, so he doesn't get bored of them.
7. We remove toys that we do not use with our child and generally make sure that the child is not distracted by too many stimuli.
8. While playing with your child, turn off the TV and generally limit environmental noise.
9. Children learn best when the activity looks interesting to them. Therefore, it is good to follow the child's choices and ideas and not to be annoyed if an activity we have chosen does not interest the child.
10. If the child shows us that he or she has lost interest, we do not continue with the activity but stop and come back at another time.

Improving communication

If you are interested in improving your communication with your child, ask yourself the following questions:

• Do you give the child time to answer or respond to what you have said?
• Before you talk to the child, have you made sure he or she is paying attention to you?
• Do you try not to talk too fast?
• Do you sit where the child can see you when you talk to him/her?
• Do you follow your child's play?
• Do you comment on what your child is doing or looking at?
• Do you use strong facial expressions and voice changes to reinforce the verbal message?
• Do you rephrase what you said if your child didn't understand you?