What can I do from home to help my child's speech and language skills? Here are some easy go-to tricks of the trade to help boost those language skills at home:
Simply do things together. Involve your child in anything you are doing: gardening, shopping, baking, organizing, cleaning, playing music...whatever you are doing- do it with your child. Talk about what you're doing, why you're doing it, why you like it or don't like it, what it reminds you of, who it makes you think about or try to make any other connections while you work or "play" together. Try to keep your language focused on narrating your thoughts/opinions/memories as opposed to asking questions to the child. The idea is to fill their mind with information and to ignite their responses back to you.
Use language-focused websites which mask the language skills and become fun and carefree games for your child to play. I like pinkcatgames.com, abcya.com, cokogames.com and toytheater.com. Some of these sites allow you to choose the grade level and specific skill you would like to focus on while playing.
Look back at baby books, pictures and photo albums with your child. Talk about who, where, what you were doing, why you were there and more. Looking at old pictures is always so much fun and allows for so much language exchange between you and your little one.
