First Words and BUILDING Language

Understanding and enhancing your child's language skills can feel overwhelming, especially if this is talking is not coming naturally for your child. In our latest podcast episode, You’re Child’s First Words and Building Language, we break down this complex process and provides practical strategies and resources to help parents navigate this critical phase of child development.

First words form the foundation of a child's vocabulary, and the choice of these words is important. Contrary to popular belief, quality trumps quantity in language building. The episode emphasizes the significance of meaningful words in a child's vocabulary. Incorporating elements that the child interacts with daily, such as favorite toys, people, pets, and foods, can make a considerable difference in their language development. Teaching action words, prepositions, self-pronouns, greetings, and names can be equally essential in enhancing a toddler's communication skills. For instance, teaching them the word 'open' if their favorite snack is in a bag or 'up' if they want to be picked up can be very effective. Having a variety of words then helps the child have a foundation for moving into phrases and sentences.

Another significant topic covered in the episode is the challenge of articulation. Breaking down complex words into syllables can encourage a child's first attempts at communication. Simplifying words and taking the child's lead when it comes to pronunciation can prove beneficial.

Understanding that every child's language journey is unique and requires personalized attention is key. After working with many families and helping them create specific word lists and plans for their child, we created several resources that would help make this process easier for families and other speech therapists working with families of late talkers. The first resource is the Daily Routines and First Words Cards. These cards are helpful for parents and caregivers to see what target words are important to be saying during routines that happen daily in a child’s life. These are words that need to be modeled frequently and consistently throughout a child’s day, and these cards serve as a great visual for reach routine. The second resource is the First Words Bundle. This resource helps guild parents in creating first word lists that are specific and unique to their child, along with how to use those words to build into phrases and sentences. It also gives practice pages for working on building with words, along with a list of words that should not be worked on in those early stages. Both of these resources are very useful for early talkers, and a guide on how to use them can found when listening to our podcast episode You’re Child’s First Words and Building Language.