Pregnancy
Help Your Toddler Use Ideas and Symbols
Connect words with activities
Even as you offer your toddler nonverbal ways to express his feelings, it's important for you to use words as the two of you play. By connecting words with his actions and their underlying affects, or emotions, you will help him move into using speech. Words and symbols are learned most quickly if you connect them to your child's gestures, motivations, and strong feelings. Always try to relate the gestural and the symbolic, at least in the early stages of a child's speech development. For instance, if your little boy is enamored with racing cars, you can zoom your car near his, and excitedly call out the word "Fast!" while you do it. Then your car can creep by his at a snail's pace, while you murmur "Slooow." If you vary your car's speed while using appropriate words to label the action, your toddler may soon take part in the fast-slow-fast game with his own car. Before too long he'll comprehend that your words label the actions that he's able to see and duplicate, and he'll probably lay claim to these new words and use them himself. New words are quickly picked up in the context of an absorbing activity. If your little boy proudly shows you his mound of jelly beans, devilishly but gently take one and say "Mine!" (Once is cute, twice is teasing and no fair!) See whether he retorts, "Mine!" When your puppy licks your toddler's sticky cheeks and his face lights up with delight, he may learn the words "Doggie licks!" If, as you sternly take a needle from your child's hand, you shake your head and say, "Sharp! Danger!" you'll be increasing the odds that these words will also stick. You may notice that your child seems eager to use words, but has a little difficulty in getting his tongue in the right position, or in making certain sounds. You might even recognize your own speech patterns in the rhythm of his babble, although individual words may cause him trouble. Enthusiastically encourage these fledgling attempts to use words, and don't be critical of his pronunciation. Just keep him talking and sometimes play copycat games with different sounds, beginning with easy ones that he can do. Parents quite naturally verbalize the ideas they see in a child's play. For instance, when you see your toddler rummaging through the toy chest in search of a favorite red block to cap off his tower, and hear him muttering "Reh, reh," you might observe, "Oh, are you looking for the red block to put on top?" Your comments give him extra practice in making himself understandable as he tries to respond to you. On other occasions your words may prod your child to articulate a need or voice an opinion. If you announce, "It's time to close down the toy factory. The master toy maker is going to sleep!" your toddler will probably be inspired to say "No, get up!" Don't forget that children's musculature matures at different rates, and your toddler may just take a little longer than some to organize his mouth and tongue into the shape of the words he knows he wants to use. Other children may be eager to use their new words but take a little longer to comprehend the sounds their parents utter. You can try slowing down the pace of your words, or simplifying your verbal instructions. Be sure to keep up an expressive intonation and speaking rhythm. Utterances in a monotone are harder for your child to understand. The important thing is to make sure that your toddler eventually responds gesturally or verbally to your gestures and words. Every response he gives you means that he is taking in your words or gestures and getting practice in opening and closing circles of communication.
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Excerpted from:
Copyright © 1999 by Stanley I. Greenspan. Excerpted from Building Healthy Minds: The Six Experiences That Create Intelligence And Emotional Growth In Babies And Young Children with permission of its publisher, Perseus Books Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
To order this book visit perseusbooksgroup.com.
