As parents, hearing our children learn to speak is often one of the most interesting and entertaining phases of their early development. Listening to them make more sounds as they chatter away, and then hearing those sounds make way for proper words and an advancing vocabulary is joyful.
Many parents worry about language development or are keen to help their children develop their language skills to make communication easier. The good news is the best ways to help kids boost their language skills are great fun. Here’s a look at some of the best.
Reading
Reading to your child and, later, listening to them read and enjoying stories together is one of the best ways to introduce language, a more expansive vocabulary, and a love of words. Spend time reading daily before your children are old enough to pay attention. They’ll love spending time with you and hearing your voice. Then, as they age, introduce a bedtime story that will help them sleep.
Audiobooks are also a great way to read books together and enjoy stories. We frequently listen to audiobooks while driving to and from activities and appointments, or when road tripping. My kids are so used to hearing the actors on the audiobooks use different voices and accents for different characters in the books that they do this themselves when they are reading aloud with each other.
Enjoy Engaging Conversation
Another fantastic way to boost language is to enjoy conversation. Even when your children are very young, make sure you are talking to them. Talk about what you do around the house, things you spot when walking, and the games you play. Then, as they get older and start to join in, make sure you are listening to them and engaging with their chatter.
Mealtimes are a great time to engage in conversation. Take time to engage each child in conversation and let them tell something about their day. Even young children can share something they’ve done or heard that day. They may want to talk about a book they read or a TV show they watched. Encourage questions and answer as honestly (and age-appropriately) as possible.
Role Play Games
Role-playing games with toys and costumes are another great way to encourage kids to talk more. They may want to role play parts from a movie they watched or book they read, or something they recently saw. For example, my children enjoy role playing pets and vets or superheroes.
Play Word Games
As your children get a little older, word games are a fantastic way to introduce different words and show them how to enjoy words and language. Games like Scrabble are great, and you can make spelling more interesting with Unscramblewords.net.
Listen to Music
Songs, whether pop music on the radio or nursery rhymes are easy to remember and an effective way to aid speech development and comprehension. All of my kids love singing and even my 5-year-old will belt out lines from his favourite songs. Singing is a great way to work on pronunciation, because often songs are sung slower than we’d speak words, so kids have more time to form the letters and words.
Make Animal Sounds
As your children get older, they might grow out of making animal sounds and copying behaviors, but while they are very little, language is as much about sounds as the actual words that are said. Most kids love animals, and playing with animal toys while making animal sounds, or even visiting zoos and farms and making sounds together, will help them learn more about what sounds they can make, their mouths’ positions, and different ways to communicate. Those early ‘woofs’ and ‘moos’ are familiar first sounds, and it’s an important phase.
Watch TV
Too much TV is often seen as the enemy of our children’s development. But actually, a little TV offers exposure to language and speech. Try to watch educational TV when possible, but even their colorful favorites, especially the shows with lots of songs and rhymes, will help to boost their language skills.
Spend Time with Different People
Parents are children’s first teachers and who they learn the elements of speech and language from. But most of us have a fairly set vocabulary. In day-to-day life, we use very similar words. A fantastic way to expose your children to different sounds and words is to spend time around different people, enjoying different conversations. Children often find it easier to learn from other children, so time with older siblings, family members, or even at playgroups, can be useful.
Remember, each child develops differently. You can have fun helping them to develop their language skills, but there’s no set path. Some children will be saying far more words than others by the time they start school, and you may find that siblings are entirely different. If you are worried about your child’s speech development, trust your instincts and ask for help.
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