Speech Therapy Adelaide
Are you trying to figure out how you can support your child's speech and language development at home? Is he/she already accessing services from Speech Pathologists in Adelaide but you'd still like to do more? Here are some suggested activities that you can engage with your child to support their development at home - as recommended by our Speech Therapists in Adelaide!
Silly Sound Play
Play with various sounds with your child, this can be done through book reading (e.g., ‘Going on a Bear Hunt’, ‘Dear Zoo’, and picture books) or pretend play (imitating animals) such as: -
- ‘bzzzz’ as in a buzzing bee
- ‘sssss’ as in a slimy snail
- ‘ribbit’ as in, the frog goes….
- ‘splish, splash’ goes the water
You can incorporate big body movements, such as imitating a jumping frog, for ‘ribbit’, or pretending to splash in puddles.
Not all sounds have to be in words, you can include tongue clicking, snoring, roaring. You will notice your child beginning to attempt to copy these sounds as he becomes engaged with sound play.
Copying
Acknowledge and support your child's sound attempts by playfully copying what he says. For example, while banging on a pot your child might vocalise ‘ah-ah-ah’, repeat these sounds whilst adding a new sound to provide meaning, for example ‘bam’ or ‘boom’.
Join Sounds with Actions
Include actions to sounds such as rocking, swinging, and tickling. For example, bounce your child on your knee, saying ‘buh-buh-buh’. Stop the motion and see if your child attempts these sounds for ‘more’. Include interest in your sounds by making them higher, lower, include big facial expressions and gestures to entice him.
Singing and Music:
Sing nursery rhymes, or familiar songs with your child, including gestures and actions. For example, ‘Itsy Bitsy Spider’, ‘Pat-a-Cake’, ‘The Wheels on the Bus’, and ‘Five Little Monkeys’.
Activities List
Bubbles: ‘POP’ the bubbles
Cars and trucks: Practice ‘beep beep!’, ‘brrooom’. Make them crash and practice ‘smash’, ‘crash’, ‘boom’.
Doll play: pretend feeding, bathing, and putting the baby to sleep targeting words such as ‘bath’, ‘baba’, ‘baby’, ‘shhh’, ‘night’
Ball play: throw the ball ‘up’ and ‘down’, make the ball ‘crash’ and ‘push’ the ball, using ‘more’, ‘my turn’ and ‘your turn’.
Tea party: pretend sipping or chewing food, playing with speech sounds, such as ‘crunch’ or ‘ssssslurp’. Talk about how ‘yummmmy’ the food is ‘mmmm!!’.
Although these activities may seem simple, they can be very powerful when used appropriately. Our Speech Pathologists would be more than happy to support you on how to implement or modify these activities to suit your child. Contact us now.
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