LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT AT HOME

PHOTO STORIES
Family photos provide rich details for this oral-language activity.

• Collect a number of family photographs, including a number of yourself when you were young.
• Invite your child to sit with you.
• As you look through the photos, help your child name each of the people pictured.
• Ask your child to tell what is happening in each photo.

OBJECT SOUNDS
This game is a listening challenge for children of all ages.

• Set out three or four familiar objects that make different sounds when tapped, such as a book, a framed photo, a cup and a spoon.
• Give your child time to examine the objects.
• Ask your child to close his or her eyes while you tap one of the objects with a pencil.
• Have your child try to guess, by its sound, which object you are tapping.
• Let your child open his or her eyes to see if the guess was close.
• Follow the same procedure with the other objects. Or, let your child have a turn being the tapper.

TREASURE HUNT
Listening to and following directions is rewarding with this activity.

• Select a “treasure” such as stickers, paper cutouts, or new crayons.
• Hide the treasure in the room in a place where your child can easily reach it.
• Give your child “hints” for finding the object.

LETTER SEARCH
Your child will enjoy “reading the newspaper” with this letter-recognition activity.

•  Give your child a page from a newspaper and a small-tip felt marker.
• Print the first letter of your child’s name, to serve as a guide, at the top of the paper.
• Have your child look through the letters on the newspaper, searching for his special letter.
• Have him circle the letter with the marker.
• Continue in the same manner with other alphabet letters, having your child use markers of different colors to circle them.

SALT WRITING
This activity develops letter recognition through sight and touch.

• Select a dark colored baking pan (or box) with sides.
• Pour enough salt into the pan to cover the bottom.
• Show your child how to draw alphabet letters in the salt.
• To clean the salt slate, have your child gently shake the pan to even out the salt.

ALARM CLOCK FUN
Your child will love playing this simple listening game.

• Have your child stand outside the room while you set an alarm clock to go off in a couple of minutes.
• Hide the clock in a place that is accessible to your child.
• Have your child come into the room and begin to search for the clock.
• When the alarm goes off, have your child use the sound as a clue for locating the clock.

STORY BOX
Use this homemade toy for a variety of storytelling activities.

• Select a cube-shaped facial tissue box.
• Cut out four interesting magazine pictures to fit the sides of the box.
• Turn the box upside down so that the opening is at the bottom.  Tape the pictures to the sides of the box.
• Insert your hand into the box opening and tell a story about the pictures, rotating the box as you do so.

DRESS-UP BOX
Dressing up is always a popular dramatic-play activity and it is great for developing language skills.

• In a box, place old clothes and accessories for your child to play with.
• Include such items as dresses, shirts, trousers, jackets, aprons, neckties, hats, scarves, shoes, gloves, eye glasses (with lenses removed).
• Place a mirror near the box for your child to look at while he or she dresses-up.
• Ask your child to tell you what he or she is pretending to be in the different dress-up outfits.