This month our theme is all things Halloween! We have some really fun books to read together, such as “The Little Old Lady Who Wasn’t Afraid of Anything” and “Skeleton Hiccups.” I encourage you to check out books at the library to read with your kids and act out the stories together.
Some activities you can do at home include:
Decorate your child’s trick or treating bag together and make a language or articulation activity out of it. If your child is working on expanding her utterances, you can have her request different items to glue onto or decorate the bag. For instance, model and encourage “Give me blue marker” or “I want glue” rather than keeping everything in reach. If you’re working on speech sounds, collect pictures or items to decorate the trick or treat bag with that have their sound in it. While you’re decorating, model the correct production in words and sentences and encourage your child to practice the correct production. You can talk about spatial concepts as you glue sequins on to the bag, put candy in the bag, and take it out.
When you read books with your kids about fall and Halloween (or anything, really), you can talk about the story grammar markers. We’ve been learning about how to tell who the characters in a story are (they have eyes, a face, and a head) and what the setting is. Talking about the emotions of the characters (are they happy, sad, mad, etc.) expands a child’s ability to take a different perspective and make predictions about what will happen next. You can also practice labeling the actions of the characters, emphasizing that verbs are just as important as the nouns. So rather than just labeling the objects and people, you can point to a picture and say “jumping” or “laughing,” etc.
Feel free to comment with your own ideas and pictures of activities!
Some activities you can do at home include:
Decorate your child’s trick or treating bag together and make a language or articulation activity out of it. If your child is working on expanding her utterances, you can have her request different items to glue onto or decorate the bag. For instance, model and encourage “Give me blue marker” or “I want glue” rather than keeping everything in reach. If you’re working on speech sounds, collect pictures or items to decorate the trick or treat bag with that have their sound in it. While you’re decorating, model the correct production in words and sentences and encourage your child to practice the correct production. You can talk about spatial concepts as you glue sequins on to the bag, put candy in the bag, and take it out.
When you read books with your kids about fall and Halloween (or anything, really), you can talk about the story grammar markers. We’ve been learning about how to tell who the characters in a story are (they have eyes, a face, and a head) and what the setting is. Talking about the emotions of the characters (are they happy, sad, mad, etc.) expands a child’s ability to take a different perspective and make predictions about what will happen next. You can also practice labeling the actions of the characters, emphasizing that verbs are just as important as the nouns. So rather than just labeling the objects and people, you can point to a picture and say “jumping” or “laughing,” etc.
Feel free to comment with your own ideas and pictures of activities!