It is coming to that time of year when our kids can be outside! They love it and the idea of bringing them back inside to work on their speech or language work is not something any parent wants to be doing. Especially when they are content and playing happily.
So today we are in the garden and it made me think about all the opportunities I had to work with both my kids (aged 5 and 22 months) within what they were doing and enhance their skills. We didnt buy any new equipment or spend money on going somewhere. It was all with what we had here... hopefully this will give you inspiration too.
It is that time of year when our kids can be outside! They love it and the idea of bringing them back inside to work on their speech or language work is not something any parent wants to be doing. Especially when they are content and playing happily.
Water painting
I have to admit I stole this from one of E's nursery workers. She came to our house for a day once and introduced this to me.
So you equipment list is:
Sponges or paint brushes
Water
Paving surface or decking
B spent a good 20 minutes (at 22 months old) playing with the water making patterns on the ground, pouring water everywhere and generally causing destruction.
So did I use this as a language opportunity? Well...
Naming the objects: you are in an activity where you have limited stuff. This allows you to have a
With E she spent a lot of time exploring the different brushes and creating masterpieces on the paving.
Magnet Games
E (5 years old) spent a really long time just say playing with magnetic blocks. She created all types of structures and then brought them to show me.
We have these ones from amazon.
So how did I make this into an activity to support language skills:
Attention and listening: E say independently creating and then we did some joint play with it working on her joint attention skills.
Play: she came up with some imaginative ideas as to what the structures were and how they could be used. I just expanded on her ideas and she either took them or didn't.
Language: I modelled back any incorrect grammar for E and gave her vocabulary associated with the play/ideas she had in order to enhance her language. We increased her vocab by introducing new ideas.
You don't need specialist toys, or magnetic tiles - but by giving your child the opportunity to explore something in a new environment they can come up with new ideas. You just need to enhance them when required.
Animals in the soil
This particular activity went on for ages! We got some of our farm animals from the house and put them in different place in the veg raised beds. You could use any part of your garden.
Initially E hid them and B and I found them, but slowly over time it became both an imaginative play sequence and for B an opportunity for her to practice her animals by telling me when she had found one.
We also talked about the animals locations by me modelling prepositions (in/on/under/next to) and different verbs/actions which the animals were doing (hiding, eating, munching etc).
E took great pride in telling her sister different things, and B learnt so much from just being outside and having the same vocabulary from the same toys modelled to her again and again.
The animals then started to have a bath when E got hold of a pot from the water painting and started to dunk them in which changed the game completely into another imaginative play experience.
So there you go... some basic activities, with no fancy equipment. Just you, your children, an outside space and some imagination. You will get loads of opportunities to develop all areas of your children's language skills.
If you are worried about your child's development, and would like further support then please do not hesitate to get in touch and arrange a free 20 minute telephone consultation.
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