I see a lot of preschoolers in my private practice, and with good reason.  Preschoolers (ages 3-5) are right in the middle of some of the most important language learning years.  You see a huge change in how a child communicates during this time.  Preschool is a golden time to target language skills. 

Because these kids are not in all day school yet, home is still their main source of language and learning.  Preschool children no longer qualify for Early Intervention which means they (might) get some preschool services through their school district BUT families miss out on the parent training that comes with Early Intervention.  

If you have questions about how you can help your preschooler at home I have some resources that might help! 

Preschool Development - This is the page I just finished with information about preschool language skills and tips to help you work on some of them

Helping My Preschooler Learn to Learn - This is a blog post featuring some ideas on ways to help a preschooler learn new things

Summer Pre-K Program - In this blog post I share a program that I use to introduce or review new letters/sounds the summer before kindergarten.

Have fun with your preschooler and should you have questions or concerns don't be afraid to reach out to your pediatrician, preschool teacher, or SLP!

Introducing my brand new page!  Several months ago Emily Hewlett contacted me asking if there was any way we could work together to help get parents more resources regarding growth and development.  She was working on her MS degree in Public Health and needed a Preceptor to oversee her Practicum.  I was delighted to help because getting development handouts for parents has been on my wish list for ages.  Her final product is AMAZING and you can read more about it in my previous blog post.  Today I sorted her handouts into developmental stages and created a new page for my website.  You can find it at the top right hand corner of this page or you can just CLICK HERE!

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) and Read Aloud 15 MINUTES just put together some awesome handouts with good information for parents and clinicians working with children ages birth to 5.  The handouts give information detailing communication development in children and offer tips for daily reading.  

If you have young kids or work with young kids you definitely need to click below:
Identify the Signs of Communication Disorders AWESOME NEW HANDOUTS

Here are some ideas to try to help your child talk.  These are great for those 1 year olds who mostly "point and grunt", because as fun as that stage is...it is really not much fun.

Parent Speech:
Use clear simple speech with your child during play routines. The goal is to talk in phrases you want your child to copy – 1 to 2 words.
Example: Instead of saying “Go down the hall and get your shoes” say “Get your shoes”. When getting undressed use short phrases “Shoes off…shirt off…etc.” Try to use grammatically correct phrases, just shorter ones.

Echo-Expansion Modeling:
Add 1 or 2 words to what your child says when you respond back to him or her.
Example: When your child says “up” say “up… you want up”.

​Don’t Anticipate Your Child’s Needs or Wants:
Mom's and dad's are great at knowing what their kids want or need.  BUT mind-reading doesn't give your child a change to use words and ask.  Don’t anticipate your child’s every need or want before they have a chance to make them known to you.
Example: When you know your child wants a drink – instead of just handing them the drink, point and wait to see if they will request it (pointing, signing, or saying “drink”).

Sabotage the Environment:
Mess up routines so your child has to communicate his or her needs.
Example: During mealtime give everyone a spoon but “forget” to give your child a spoon. Wait and see if your child initiates they need something. If they don’t initiate what they need, help them by saying. “What do you need?” or “Are you missing something” or “Uh-oh!” Label the item before you give it to them.

Play “dumb” when your child points to a desired object.
Example: When your child points to the counter for their drink (or another desired object you know they want), say: “What do you want?” (pause) “A spoon?” (pause) “An apple?” (pause) “A drink?” …. “Oh, Drink!”

Self-Talk:
When your child is within hearing range, talk about what you are doing while you do it.
Example: When washing your hands at the sink say “wash hands”, when the phone is ringing say “I hear the phone”.

Parallel Talk:
When playing with your child, describe what your child is doing while they are doing it.
Example: When your child picks up a car – say “pick up car”. When your child drops a block – say “drop block”.

Describe what he is seeing and hearing.
Example: “That’s a ball”, When listening to music say “Music, listen to music”

My advice: take one or two ideas and try them out.  Remember when working with kids the idea is not to frustrate them more, but to model how they could do something differently.  Waiting for them to talk works wonders...demanding that they talk can really backfire.  Try to keep things light and fun and find ways to repeat, repeat, repeat!

Any quick search will help you find developmental norms for when kids start to talk...a rough estimate would be starting to use words around a year (no, ball, mama) and starting to combine words around 18 mo - 2 years (more nana, big cup).

BUT that is a long time of not talking before things get cooking...what should you be watching for in the 12-18 months before your baby really starts talking?

I think talking is probably the hardest thing humans learn...look at every other animal on the planet.  We are the only ones with an advanced system of communication!  Sure some gorillas and monkeys can sign BUT it takes them years of dedicated training to learn what our toddlers pick-up by just hanging out around us.  

That "hanging out" time that babies and toddlers enjoy is actually a pretty big deal...here are some of the skills they are learning when you think they are just playing around-

Attending - babies need to watch to be able to learn, your baby is always watching, the more you baby sees and sticks with the better.  Which leads to...

Eye Contact - babies learn to focus in on faces SUPER young for a reason, when they see your eyes they start picking up on facial cues, they watch your mouth form sounds, their little brains see you smile and then they can smile back!  That whole idea of "I am right here with you!" comes from good eye contact.

Object Permanence - babies start to figure out that when they can't see something it still exists, this is when "out of sight, out of mind" doesn't work so great any more...also when "Peek a Boo" becomes a big hit.

Mean-End - (tied into cause and effect) - babies start to understand that "If I do..... then this will happen!"  This idea is super important for later communication because babies need to get that "If I say... then this will happen".  Work with things like pushing buttons, pouring water, pulling string toys.  

JOINT ATTENTION - my personal big thing I watch for in young kids, this is the whole process of cluing into Mom and making sure she is clued into me.  It has two sides,
1) Mom points out something, the kid follows her gesture, and then looks back at Mom
2) The kid looks at (and might point to/hold up) his toy, looks at Mom, and then looks back at his toy as if to say, "Mom, are you watching this?"  
When kids are not able to use joint attention that is a big red flag for me.  Also you want to watch and make sure kids are not just trying to get something they need/want.  You need the social aspect of I want to make sure you are enjoying/seeing this with me!

Imitation - before babies begin saying words on their own they will imitate the sounds they see you make.  Usually imitation comes in these stages: actions, sounds, and then words.  I encourage parents to use baby signs once babies start imitating actions, might as well get them communicating as early as possible...and no, using baby signs will not slow down your child's use of words, it actually helps language develop faster!

Turn-taking - taking turns is key to good social skills and good language skills.  Babies learn turn-taking hand in hand with imitation (Mom does something and then it's my turn!).  Work on back and forth interactions because they build great foundations for language!

"Good social skills require good communication skills."
- Candy Lawson at the Center For Development and Learning.

Getting ready for school requires practicing more than just academic skills.  A huge factor in a child's success is how well he interacts with others.  When thinking about how your child will perform at school remember to think about more than the spelling tests and math grades...the "social skills tests" your child will face are important too.  Often kids are expected to know these skills without being taught them.  It is a good idea to take time and explicitly teach social skills, especially for the kids who need a little extra help.


Here are some social skills that are super important but that are often overlooked:
1. Greetings
2. Initiating a Conversation
3. Listening to Others
4. Taking Turns in a Conversation
5. Being Responsible for your Behavior
6. Problem-Solving Through Conflicts
7. Apologizing
8. Asking for Help
9. Ignoring Distractions
10. Staying on Topic in a Conversation

Parents and teachers can work together to determine if a child needs extra help learning to use social skills.  Many kids pick up social skills without needing to be taught outright, but it is important not to assume that all children will. Parents can model social skills during conversations at home, role-play scenarios that may be difficult at school, or look for opportunities for their children to practice needed social skills.  Teachers can reinforce skills during group activities, praise and reinforce children during the day, and be alert to refer children to a speech and language pathologist should additional support be required.

Resources:
Top 10 Social Skills Students Need to Succeed
​
Social Skills and School

Summer is the best time of the year for speech and language therapy!  No school means your kid has more time to play, explore, and learn.  Don't view summer as a chance for your child to take a break from learning.  It is a time where you can jump-start his learning through real-life experiences.

I have some clients who will be entering pre-school and kindergarten next year.  So to help them prepare I have created a systematic approach to teaching the letters and sounds in our alphabet.  I spent hours researching in what order kids developmentally learn their letters, I collaborated with other pre-k teachers and SLPs to get additional input.  Then I sorted the letters into sets with different prominent salient features highlighted for each letter.  Each set varies by place, manner and voice so each letter will stand out on it's own.

I believe in the principle of learning through contrasts (we learn that "s" is different from "b" because it looks different when you say it, it sounds different because one is long and one is short, and one uses voicing and the other does not).

You want to introduce new sets at a rate that matches your child's pace, a good goal might be one set per week.  

Set 1: Mm, Tt, Oo
Set 2: Ss, Aa, Bb
Set 3: Ff, Cc, Ww
Set 4: Xx, Ll, Pp
Set 5: Rr, Hh, Ee
Set 6: Nn, Ii, Kk
Set 7: Uu, Gg, Dd
Set 8: Yy, Qq, Zz
Set 9: Jj, Vv

Pick 2-3 sounds to focus on each day starting with Set 1.  Model both capital and lowercase letters.

Teaching ideas:
hand actions for sounds
sign language or something similar, bounce the short sounds, wave long ones
 
target sound grab bag
fill a basket with things that begin with two sounds from one set, help sort objects by sound
 
draw in sand/rice/flour
in a sand box or just a shallow bowl filled with flour draw the letters with fingers, use good letter formation (ask your child’s pre-k teacher for how she is teaching formation)
 
draw on a chalkboard: wet, dry, try
write letter with a small wet sponge, dry with a small cloth, write with chalk (idea adapted from the Handwriting Without Tears approach)
 
start blending!
short CV or CVC words:  Mom, Tom, Sam, then phrases:  I am Sam, when blending cue your child to “keep his motor running”  the sounds should keep going not be choppy
 
play receptive language games:
print out cards for the letters in your set, turn over and play memory, mix the sounds up, have the child find the sound that you name, etc.
 
use laminated papers or dry erase boards:
write a mix of the target sounds for your set, have the child erase one specific sound

*be sure to teach your child that vowels have two sounds, focus on the short sound for each vowel but always mention that vowels have two sounds.

Infants and toddlers are not expected to be able to use all of the sounds that adults use in speech. However, there are certain sounds that most kids should be able to use with consistency. Here is a chart of some approximate ages that children should acquire sounds by (at the beginnings of words). 
​
12 months: b, d, g, n, m, h
24 months: b, d, p, t, k, m, n, h, w
36 months: p, b, d, k, g, m, n, h, ch, w, l, "y" as in "yellow" and "th" as in "the"

McLeod, S., &; Bleile, K. (2003). From 2003 ASHA Convention: Neurological and developmental foundations of speech acquisition.

Here is what I like to see in 3 year-olds.

These are some ideas for things to work on/look at when your child is approaching his third birthday. Don't get too hung up on any one item, try to look at your child's speech from a wide view when they are really little (birth to 3).  For very young kids how they are using the words they have (language) is more important than how they are saying the words they have (articulation).


Sounds:
Children should be able to copy the “m”, “b”, “y”, “n”, “w”, “d”, “p”, and “h”
Children might be able to copy the “t”, “ng”, “k”, “g”, “f”, “v”, “ch”, and “j”


Words:
Children should use be using correct vowels in their words
Children should be able to say the sounds listed above in the beginning and endings of words (if they are alone and not in a group of consonants).
Children might not be able to say all of the consonants that are in a group (like the st in stop)
Children might replace a hard sound like a “v” with an easier sound like a “b”
Children should be talking with 3 or 4+ words in a phrase, expressing ideas, commenting, and requesting help.


Intelligibility:
Strangers should be able to understand around 75% of what child says (gestures included)
Parents should be able to understand around 90% of what child says (gestures included)