It’s time again for our monthly segment: Favorite Toys Without Batteries! As we talked about here, here, and here, we love toys without batteries. Below is The Speech Space’s June list of great toys that don’t make noise, so that you can get your child talking more while you play!
Twister: In it’s simplest form, Twister is great for working on following directions and simple concepts (colors, body parts, left/right). If you’re wanting to target more vocabulary, you can easily add more concepts into this game. Simply print pictures that target a theme your child is working on in school or seasonal vocabulary and tape the pictures to the game spots. Then, use the spinner to call out where to put their feet and hands.
Green Toys Trucks: We love Green Toys vehicles! They are made of recyclable material and are very sturdy. These vehicles are great for young kiddos that are about to be or already on the move. If you get the dump truck or recycling truck you and your child could play putting things in the trucks and then dumping them out (over and over again). You can even work on following directions and vocabulary by telling your child which items to put in the trucks. If they are older, your child could tell you what to help put in the trucks.
Don’t Wake the Hulk: Who doesn’t love superheroes? Kids will love this take on the classic game “Don’t Wake Daddy” but with a superhero twist. Players try to get their superhero through Hulk’s room and out his window. On each turn you’re either safe or you have to push his alarm clock, which may make him pop out of bed! The best part is that you don’t know if he’ll pop out of bed or not on each turn. This game is great for working on dealing with the unexpected, dealing with disappointment, making simple inferences, following directions, turn-taking and counting.
*This game may be less expensive on Ebay.
If you missed our other favorite toy blog posts you can read them here, here, here and here, Check back on The Speech Space blog for other fun ideas, toys and games you can do with your child to help increase their communication development.
And as always, if you have questions or concerns about your child’s development, contact us at The Speech Space! We offer free screenings, which take approximately 30 minutes, and can help identify potential problems.
You may have heard someone refer to your child’s “speech skills” or their “language skills”, when talking about their development. While they may sound similar, these are actually quite different areas of development. This post provides a quick, basic summary on the difference between these two areas.
Speech skills: Speech, which is related to how your child talks, can be split into two different areas, articulation and fluency.
Articulation refers to the way children acquire and produce sounds in words, sentences and conversation. If your child is having difficulty with their articulation development you may see things like:
difficulty producing sounds in isolation
sound distortions of consonants and/or vowels
deleting sounds in words, substituting sounds in words
difficulty sequencing sounds or syllables
Fluency is the aspect of speech production that involves smoothness, rate and effort. If your child is having difficulty with their fluency development you may see things like:
stuttering (e.g., repetition of sounds or words, blocking, interjections, etc)
rate of speech
awkward or odd breathing patterns or pauses within words or sentences
developmental stuttering
Language skills: Language can be broken down most simply into two parts: receptive language and expressive language (Note: Today we are just talking about foundational or basic language skills. We’ll cover higher-level language skills in a future post.)
Receptive language is the ability to understand what is being said and can include things like following directions or understanding questions. If your child is having difficulty with their receptive language skills, you may see things like:
trouble following directions in novel activities and daily routines
asking “what?” or saying “huh?” consistently after questions
trouble pointing to or identifying vocabulary in books or activities
difficulty understanding sentences that are longer in nature and/or contain a lot of detail or concepts (e.g., can you find the big, red truck)
Expressive language is the ability to use language and includes things like grammar, vocabulary and answering questions. If your child is having difficulty with their expressive language development, you may see things like:
difficulty using distinguishing features or functions (e.g., “Mommy look at that little dog.” vs. “Mommy look dog.”)
Some children may have trouble with one of these areas of communication (speech or language) or both. Some children may have difficulty with one area of their language development, but not the other (receptive vs. expressive).
Looking out for potential red-flags with your child’s development is the best way to combat any difficulties in these communication areas. Identifying areas of weakness and working on them early gives your child the best chance to make progress and catch up to their peers!
If you have questions or concerns about your child’s development, contact us at The Speech Space. We offer free screenings, which take approximately 30 minutes, and can help identify potential problems.
This month for our “Toys Without Batteries” post, we decided to switch things up and post about a few toys we like that do have batteries. Battery powered toys are not always a bad thing, even though we tend to veer more towards no batteries in our therapy sessions. Many children are truly more motivated by toys that move, make noise, or light up and this is totally fine. If it gets your child talking, we’re on board! In that direction, we present toys we love that have batteries.
1. Elefun: We honestly cannot say enough about how much young children love this game. It’s been around forever and if you take care of it, this toy can last a long time (we have one that’s over 10 years old!). We like to start out talking about the parts of this toy (the nets, the elephant, his trunk, the butterflies). If you have multiple children with you, have them ask each other what color net they would like to use, which will encourage social language. Encourage your child to tell you WHERE to put the elephant, HOW to turn it on, WHAT will happen when it’s turned on etc. **Pro-tip: In order to keep Elefun in tip-top shape, we lay out 2 ‘rules’ when we play: 1.) no punching your hand through the net and 2.) adults are the only ones to touch the trunk.
2 Curious George Hide and Seek Zoo: There is a lot happening in this game, which is why we think kids like it so much. The man in the yellow hat is flying around the zoo and he finds that a bunch of things are wrong! He uses his walkie talkie to tell George (and your child) where there is a problem. This game is great for working on problem-solving skills (e.g., “What’s happening in this picture?”, “Why is this a problem?”, “How can they fix it?”). Your child will love using the walkie talkie and there is a fun part of the game where the animals escape and your child can put on a mask and hide!
**Pro-tip: this game is available on Amazon, but may be less expensive on ebay
3. Bubble Machine: A machine that shoots out bubbles!? It’s definitely as much fun as it sounds. We like to use this for increasing vocabulary by having children “get” different items or objects around the room/house with the bubble machine. Then, change it up and have them tell you what to “get.” You can even make it harder by giving “clues” or playing “I spy” when playing this game.
4. Playskool Explore N Grow Busy Gears: This is a toy geared more for the little ones (think 9-18 months). We call this a ‘cause and effect’ toy because it teaches children that when they do one thing (in this toy, push a button), something happens (the gears light up and spin around). Obviously, the lights and spinning gears are what helps keep the child’s engagement but you can use this to work on colors, asking them simple ‘wh’ questions so they can point to answer, and following simple directions.
If you missed our other favorite toy blog posts you can read them here, here, and here. Check back on The Speech Space blog for other fun ideas, toys and games you can do with your child to help increase their communication development.
And as always, if you have questions or concerns about your child’s development, contact us at The Speech Space! We offer free screenings, which take approximately 30 minutes, and can help identify potential problems.
The use of technology with children is something a lot of parents debate over. We are here to help you figure out this conundrum!
The American Academy of Pediatrics recently updated their recommended guidelines on this very topic. You may be surprised that your child should not have ANY screen time before 18 months of age (with the exception of video chatting with family and friends). While there are times when 100% pure distraction is critical (like visiting grandparents a plane ride away), this should be a rare exception. Before your child turns 3, they are not really registering the content of the shows, just the highly addictive, constantly changing colors, noises, and shapes. Read below for the updated guidelines put out by the American Academy of Pediatrics:
Children younger than 18 months:
Avoid use of screen media other than video-chatting
Children 18 to 24 months of age:
Parents who want to introduce digital media should choose high-quality programming, and watch it with their children to help them understand what they’re seeing
For children ages 2 to 5 years:
Limit screen use to 1 hour per day of high-quality programs. Parents should co-view media with children to help them understand what they are seeing and apply it to the world around them.
For children ages 6 and older:
Place consistent limits on the time spent using media, and the types of media, and make sure media does not take the place of adequate sleep, physical activity and other behaviors essential to health.
Designate media-free times together, such as dinner or driving, as well as media-free locations at home, such as bedrooms.
Have ongoing communication about online citizenship and safety, including treating others with respect online and offline.
The Georgetown Early Learning Project is another amazing source of information. Dr. Rachel Barr and her team have gathered extremely important and significant information about early child development and screen time. Below are some quick take-away points from their information:
Co-viewing with your child is vital for their engagement and language development
Screens should be shut off 1 hour before bedtime to help promote good sleeping habits (the lights from screens can contribute to sleep disruption–this goes for adults too!)
Set clear guidelines (and a timer if needed) to end screen time– and be consistent.
Children 5 years and younger learn through interactions and joint engagement, not through watching and/or clicking on a screen.
Children 0-6 months of age are really into faces, so no need to even have a screen on for them!
At 6 months old children can recognize pictures, but can’t yet make the reference or association of them (meaning they can’t transfer what they see from a screen to real life).
Children from 9-12 months may seem super “focused” or “engaged” during screen time, but they are not truly getting the content of what they are seeing. Instead what is keeping their attention is the constant and frequent changes in features on the screen (e.g., noise, volume, light, pictures, etc). The people that produce these shows or games know exactly what they are doing to keep your child glued to the screen, but what they are seeing is not actually helping their development at all.
At 3 years old children are actually able to transfer what they see or watch on a screen to real life.
Shows with “real life things”, like Mr. Rogers or Sesame Street, are what children actually connect to
We hope you find this quick outline of guidelines and information helpful when making your plan of attack with screen time!
The Speech Space is giving away a free evaluation, in recognition of May being “better speech and hearing” month! Enter via email at info@thespeechspacedc.com by Monday May 15th. The winner will be emailed on Tuesday May 16th. If you are having concerns about your child’s development this is a perfect opportunity to get some answers and make a plan.
Did you know that books are a great way to work on your child’s critical thinking and problem-solving skills? At The Speech Space we are huge fans of books. The choices for books are endless and these days there are SO MANY great ones! Here is a list of current kid-favorites that are great for working on critical thinking and problem solving skills:
Lost and Found by Oliver Jeffers: When a penguin shows up at his door, a boy decides to find out where the penguin came from and get him home. The journey back to the South Pole is difficult and the boy tells the penguin stories to pass the time. When they get to the South Pole, the penguin looks sad and the boy realizes that the penguin wasn’t lost, he was just lonely. This book is great for working on inferences, predictions, sequencing, and emotions.
The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson: As a mouse is walking in the forest, he meets a fox, an owl, and then a snake, who all want to eat him for dinner. Instead of being eaten, the smart mouse invents The Gruffalo, who happens to enjoy eating each of these animals for dinner to scare them away. Turns out that The Gruffalo is real! This book is great for ‘wh’ questions (e.g., who, what, where), predictions, inferences, and sequencing.
Gilbert Goldfish Wants a Pet by Kelly DiPucchio: Gilbert is a goldfish who has a pretty awesome life. But, the one thing he wants and the one thing he doesn’t have is a pet. Gilbert goes on a long journey to find a pet, experiencing different situations and emotions. In the end, thank goodness, he gets his wish! This book is great for working on “why” questions, inferences, emotions, and sequencing.
The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry, and The Big Hungry Bear by Don & Audrey Wood: In this story a little mouse finds a delicious, ripe strawberry. As he’s going to get the strawberry he is told about a big, hungry bear that can smell a ripe strawberry miles away! The mouse goes into a panic trying to figure out ways to protect his ripe strawberry (don’t worry, in the end he figures out a way!). This book is great for working on WH- questions (what, where, why, etc), inferencing, predictions, emotions, and sequencing.
Books are not only great for comprehension and vocabulary, but also for critical thinking and problem solving. As you read books to your child, try to use personal connections to help them relate to the story (e.g.,”He wants a pet. What pet do we have?”, “If you could have a pet, what would you chose?”).
If your child is able to answer simple WH questions (e.g., who, what, where, when), work on asking questions that require them to apply the knowledge they have to make inferences (e.g., “Why is the mouse trying to hide the strawberry?”, “How might he feel if the bear got his strawberry? How would you feel?”) and predictions (e.g., “The boy seems to miss the penguin. What might he do?”). After you finish the story see if your child can sequence and retell the story back to you (feel free to flip through the pages together again while they are sequencing and retelling the story).
These are just a few kid-favorite books (and frankly The Speech Space therapists’ favorites too). Check back on the blog for more ideas to help encourage your child’s speech and language development.
If you have questions or concerns about your child’s s development, contact us at The Speech Space. We offer free screenings, which take approximately 30 minutes, and can help identify potential problems.
Spring Break is coming up in DC! School breaks can be an amazing opportunity to spend time with your child and make sure they’re getting a language rich experience. Often parents feel overwhelmed with choices or may not have many ideas of what to do. You don’t have to go on a trip to make this break an exciting time, and depending on your family dynamics, you may need to stay close to home. Staycations can be fun and give you the opportunity to connect with your child. We’re here to give you some easy and fun ideas of things you can do during your staycation to have fun and really encourage your child’s language development.
Monday: Library and Books
1. Talk about libraries:
What is inside libraries
Who works there
What kinds of things can you do in a library (e.g., read, listen to stories, check out books.)
What are the appropriate voice levels at the library (inside vs outside voices)
How we check out books
Giving your child a “preview” about what you may see and do will give them a lot of the vocabulary that is used in libraries. Also, when you prepare your child for the experiences they are about to have, they’ll feel more confident talking about what they see.
2. Discuss how you’ll get to the library. Modes of transportation are almost always an interesting topic for children. Although you may live close to a library, perhaps you’re going to a new library that day for a specific story time or group activity. Will you drive? Walk? Bike? If you live in DC, will you metro? Although grown-ups can get tired of the metro system, it’s usually a novel and exciting experience for kids and gives your child a lot to talk about (taking escalators, metro cards, what lines will you take, what stop will you get off, etc).
4. While you travel to the library, talk about what kinds of books your child might like and how you will go about finding them. Maybe you’ll ask the librarian or look it up on a computer in the library. Also, talk about how many books you will check out.
5. Once you’re done and home, talk about all the steps you took to get to the library. Discuss what you saw, what you did, and what you got. Parents often ask their children, “What did you do today?”, when they have been at school, but it’s just as important to ask this same question when you’ve been with your child all day. It makes it easier to help them recall the sequence and details of events and helps get rid of the “I don’t know” answer since you can help them remember!
Tuesday: Indoor Pools or Water Play Day
In DC, there are a few indoor water parks; however, if you live in a warmer climate or if the weather if the weather during Spring Break is nice, you may just want to keep the water fun in your own backyard! Either way, there is so much language associated with water play to bring out language in kids.
1. If you are going to a pool, the first thing to talk about is how we interact with water. It’s always a good idea to review how we play in and around water. See how many rules or ways we play in the water (wearing floaties, making sure parent is around in the water, no running on the pool deck, etc.) your child can name. This is a good way to see how much your child remembers about water rules.
2. Whether you are going to the pool or doing water play at your house, you and your child can work on building their vocabulary and association concepts during your water play day.
Talk about attributes of water (e.g., cold, wet, deep, shallow)
What we wear in water
Different bodies of water (pool vs. ocean vs. lake, etc)
The different things you can see in these bodies of water (e.g.. if heading to a pool, lifeguards)
If you are going to the pool, what do you need to bring with you (towels, bathing suits, any pool toys, etc)
3. Some kids have difficulty understanding and using negatives correctly (e.g., not, no, none). To target negatives, you can play a sorting game with your child. You can pull some items from around your house and decide if they can go in the water or if they cannot go in the water (this may vary depending on if you are going to a pool or doing water play at home). Then your child can pull out items (either the same ones you did or new ones) and decide if the items go in the water or not. Some examples could be: clothing items, stuffed animals, cars, bath toys, food items. You can talk about if they DO or DO NOT go in water.
4. If you are doing water play at home, you can use this opportunity to work on language concepts to help build your child’s vocabulary. Maybe your child wants to pretend they are in the arctic during their water play– what animals would they see, what would the water feel like, you could even add ice cubes to make it cold or use as glaciers! You can do this for other bodies of water too and add items that go with them (e.g., ocean, lake, pond). This activity is great for building your child’s vocabulary skills by giving opportunities for working on category and association concepts, comparing and contrasting, and even attributes (color, shape, size, number).
Wednesday: Parks and Playgrounds
1. Start this activity by talking about which park is your child’s favorite. Every park has so many different features, you can compare/contrast equipment in various parks (e.g.,”They both have slides, but this one has a merry-go-round and that one has swings.”).
2. Once you decide where to go, describe all the parts of the park. Are there sidewalks? What’s on the ground? Think of all the pieces of play equipment. Is it big or small? What colors are there on the play equipment?
3. Discuss how you’ll get there and the steps you take to get to the park. Will you drive or walk or bike or scooter? What do you need for each of these?
.4. Maybe you’ll decide to have a snack or lunch while you are at the park or playground. If so, you can have your child help you prepare and pack your snack or lunch. While doing this you can work on categories (fruits vs. vegetables; drinks vs. foods, etc), comparing/contrasting (e.g., “The fruit snacks are red and the carrots are orange.”) and even sequencing (e.g., while you prepare the sandwich together talk about all the steps you are doing to make the sandwich: first we get out the bread, what do we do next?).
5.. As you’re on the way to the park or playground, describe the things that you see. You can play “I Spy” as you go to draw your child’s attention to what’s in the sky or on the ground or in the street.
Thursday: Cooking
Cooking is a great way to help your child work on sequencing and retelling activities in a hands on way, plus, it can get you to the store to do your grocery shopping!
1. Start by picking one or two (easy) things to make. Fruit salad, cookies, smoothies,or chex mix are some easy and safe things to try out for first time chefs.
2. Make a list of all the ingredients you’ll need for each thing you’ll make. We like to try to draw pictures of the items when we cook, although neither of us are great artists! It will help your child to retell and sequence with pictures, so try it out if you can.
3. Next, go to the store. Give your child 2 items to go find for your recipes (on the aisle you are on). If they find those, see if they can get 3 items. Making this a game will help keep them busy and help them to work on following directions with multiple concepts.
4. When you get home, get the recipe(s) and have your child gather the ingredients as you read them, or vice versa. As you begin ‘cooking,’ try to use sequence words (first, second, third; first, next, last; first, then;before, after, etc) and give 1 or 2 steps at a time (depending on what your child can do). For example: “First wash the strawberries and then cut them.” (for cutting, we like these knives)
5. Having your child tell you what things are used to perform certain tasks is another good language activity (e.g., “What do we use to cut the fruit?”, “What do we use to bake the cookies?”). Or, have them get things in categories (“Get all the fruit.” or “Get all the utensils.”, etc).This will help your child begin to think of objects in different ways, build associations, as well as, their vocabulary.
6. When you’re ready to eat, try to work on describing the foods. You can use categories, color, taste, size, temperature, and/or texture. Then, bon appétit!
Friday: Around the House
There are some common items around your house that kids will love to play with. Feel free to experiment and see what piques your child’s interest and creates the most language-rich experiences.
1. Shaving cream is one of our favorites. Most children really love squishing their hands in shaving cream and there’s a lot to talk about as they do. The color, how it feels, what you could pretend that it is, what you can draw in it…the list could go on and on! We love to put small animal toys and pretend it’s snow, or drive cars through shaving cream and pretend it’s a car wash, or draw in it (a great way to practice making letters or shapes).
2. Water in a tub or bucket is another great idea. Kids love water for some reason (unless they have to take a bath!). Get bowls, measuring cups, lids- anything around the house that could scoop up water. You can also do experiments with various objects (e.g., coins, tissues, pencils, figurines, blocks) to see which items float and which ones do not
3. Tape is surprisingly exciting to use in order to make pictures or just to play with. We like the Washi tape or duct tape with different patterns to make pictures. You can put them on paper or make designs on the sidewalk. Have them tell you about the colors, shapes, or designs they make.
4. If it’s a nice day and you have a good patch of sidewalk or walkway in front of where you live, grab some chalk and go outside! We like to play hop-scotch, which is a fun way to work on counting! You and your child can draw the hop-scotch squares together or you can each have your own hop-scotch squares. You can also take the opportunity to work on things like categories (e.g., “Let’s draw zoo animals” or “Let’s draw some food for our outside pretend snack! Should we draw vegetables or desserts?”,), attributes (i.e., colors, shapes, size, number), prepositions (e.g., “Let’s draw a sun above our flowers.”, “Our house needs a door. Should we put it under the windows or next to the windows?”),
5. Build a marble tower out of recyclable materials around your house! Think of all those paper towel rolls, toilet paper rolls, yogurt containers, bubble wrap, boxes and other things you collect over just one week. You and your child can work together to build your very own, homemade marble tower. This activity is really great for problem-solving, team work, making predictions, coming up with solutions and getting creative. You can even YouTube a video before you start building so your child can get excited and inspired about the different possibilities.
We hope you and your family have a great Spring Break! Maybe you have some favorite staycation ideas you and your child do together? Feel free to share your ideas in our comments section.
If you are having concerns about your child’s development reach out to us at The Speech Space. We offer free screenings, which take approximately 30 minutes, and can help identify potential problems.
