Fronted adverbials. Conjunctions. Determiners. These are just some of the fantastic pieces of technical vocabulary that all children in the UK need to know for their year 6 SATS. Now unless you have taken a linguistics degree, the chances are you don’t know what these words mean, which can make helping with homework very hard. […]
Today, I’m going right back to the earliest building blocks of language – babble. Parents are often (understandably) concerned about when their child said their first word. However, there are other stages of development that come before that. What is babble? Babies make sound from the moment they are born. Obviously, they cry! They all […]
I often see children for assessment who are using a few words, but have a limited range of language. Often these children tend to just say one word when they speak, rather than linking 2 or more words together. So today I’m going to talk about when children start to move on from single words […]
I know not everyone likes fireworks and that the actual reason we celebrate Bonfire Night is tricky, so this post may not be for everyone. But I love this time of year, except the getting dark really early bit! There are so many different things happening that prove to be great opportunities for discussion with […]
How to improve language skills while hiding rocks Have you joined in with the latest craze of painting and hiding rocks? We have. My daughter’s two favourite things are art and rocks so it is an activity which seems to have been designed specifically for her! We have all had great fun painting them. Also, […]
When teaching a speech sound in therapy, there are a number of things therapists do to help support the child. Equally, when you are helping a child generalise a sound into their speech at home or in the classroom, there are ways to help as well. Today I’m going to talk about cueing. Now […]
Should you sign with your child? This is a something that I often get asked about. Often people want to focus on verbal language and think that signing with a child will hold their speech back. Actually, nothing could be further from the truth! Here are some of the reasons why signing can help a […]
I am lucky that I get to work regularly with my clients and their families and schools, so have the advantage that I get to know them well. But the first time I meet a child and am making my assessment, there is some really important information I need from the people that know them […]
I know that many parents worry about their child learning colour words. I do understand that many nurseries like a child to know their letters, numbers and colours. But as a speech and language therapist, checking if a child knows their colours is not the first thing on my list! I want to make sure […]
We all know how useful and important books are for children’s learning. Helen wrote this post about using books to develop language skills. One of my favourite books to use with younger children is ‘Dear Zoo’ by Rod Campbell. It is a simple lift the flap book, but you can use it to target lots […]
