Chitter Chatter Speech & Language Therapy Sri Lanka

28/05/2023

Joint Attention also known as shared attention is how a child shares an experience with you. It is when two people coordinate their attention on a common object, person or an event. It develops very early in life as early as infancy.
 
Joint attention is a skill that involves gaining a person’s attention, maintaining that attention as well as shifting it. It can be established through eye gaze, gesture (pointing), words or sounds. It is one of the prerequisite skills a toddler will master before they begin to understand the words to communicate.
 
While playing you blow bubbles and the toddler looks at the bubbles with excitement, laughs and looks back at you to suggest “I want you to do that again”. This look from the toddler to the bubbles and then to you to gain attention is known as Join Attention.
 
Why is it Important?
Children develop language by interacting with others & assigning meaning to the words they hear. They listen to adults talk about a toy they are playing with, and this allows children to match the meaning to the words they hear. This is the foundation for developing their receptive (understanding) & expressive (spoken)language.
 
Joint attention allows children to develop their turn taking skills, initiate or respond to an interaction by using gestures, sounds or words. It also helps children to develop and learn new play skills by observing their caregivers.
 
By the age of two most children are able to engage in sustained joint attention with others and use language to communicate their experiences/needs. As children develop, they become more skilled at sharing attention in different environments such as learning new information at school or during play activities.
 
Difficulties in joint attention are usually observed in individuals with Developmental disorders/delays. 🇱🇰

20/05/2023

Learning to communicate involves more than just using words. Children need to develop these Pre-Linguistic skills before they begin to talk.

Many toddlers learn these skills instinctively but some may need more support to master or develop them. Therefore it might be useful to find out whether these Pre-Language skills are present in a child before we start working on language skills/words.

12/03/2023

11/03/2023

Here are some common examples of stimming you might see.

Learn more here: https://www.andnextcomesl.com/2021/09/stimming-behaviors.html

26/11/2022

This week we are thinking about reluctant talkers and selective mutism!

Credit: Powys Children's Speech and Language Therapy Service

04/07/2022

Kids love car tracks🚗!! This is a fun way to support EARLY LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT in toddlers👶 and preschool children👧🏻🧒. It is a simple toy which is great for practising a variety of communication skills. Following are some of the skills that can be targeted;

Requesting : This will teach a child that they will be required to ask/request for something using gestures or words before they can actually get it e.g I want , give, more, again

Anticipating : Hold the car on top of track and say “ 1…2…3….” Or “ Ready.. Steady ….” then pause before you say “GO” . The child will anticipate by looking at you, smiling , vocalizing, clapping or getting excited .

Turn taking skills : My turn/ your turn

Sounds : beep beep, brrrrm brrm, wow, yay, wohoo

Labeling / nouns : Will help your child to learn new words therefore increase their vocabulary e.g garage, ramp, car etc

Action words/ verbs : open/close, slide it , push, pull, clean up, pick up, fall/fell down , turn, crash, bump

Adjectives / describing words: e.g red / blue,green, big /small

Basic Concepts: up/down, open/close, on/in/ under

Following directions/commands: You can see whether your child understands what you are saying & can complete that direction/command eg. “give car “, “give the red car”, “put the car in the garage” etc

Making a choice : You can offer the child a choice of which car s/he needs. e.g Do you want the red car or the yellow car?

Answering questions : We can ask them simple Yes/No or WH questions (what,who, where) e.g Do you want the red car? Yes/No, Where is the car ? In the garage

Increasing utterances : Combine words to make phrases/sentences. e.g Car —> “ red car”. —-> “ red car on the track”

27/06/2022

Bubbles 🫧are fun!!! It’s a great tool to get a child’s attention and to sustain their attention. Kids 👦🏽👧🏻love bubbles🫧 !Reason why bubbles 🫧are so awesome is because it’s naturally motivating. I use it as a reward or for motivation in almost all my speech sessions.

Here are some of the reasons why we use bubbles🫧 in our speech sessions ;
- To teach 🗣sounds,new words and expand utterances
- It encourages and promotes eye 👁 contact : you can wait till the child looks at you to blow more bubbles
- Helps to gain and sustain attention
- Helps to practise turn taking skills
- Requesting skills 🫴: get the child to request for bubbles e. give, want, more
- Answering questions🙋 e.g Yes/ no questions , WH questions (who, what, where)
- Following directions: you can get the child to follow simple commands/directions e.g look up/ down, Pop the bubbles on the table

Following are some of the sounds/words /phrases you can target during this activity;

Verbs( Action words) : jump, catch , pop, run, turn, stomp , clap , blow, help, dip, look, float, poke etc
Requesting 🫴 : give, want , more, again
Turn taking skills: my turn / your turn
Sounds/noises: wohooo, yay, hurray , wow
Anticipation : 1, 2, 3 Go, ready/steady/ Go…
Basic concepts : open/close , in, on, under, up/down, full/empty , few/many
Adjectives : big ,small, clear, slimy, soapy, colors
Answering questions e.g Do you want more bubbles ? “Yes/no “, Who is blowing bubbles? “ mom/me/you”
Expanding utterances🗣e.g bubbles on the table, I want more bubbles

🫧

11/05/2022

01/01/2022

16/07/2021

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11/11/2020

This week we are thinking about speech sounds! 🔡

Have you ever thought about how your lips, teeth, tongue and palate are used to make all the consonant sounds in English? This picture helps us to see which sounds are made where. Talking is hard work!

03/07/2020

This week we are thinking about communication opportunities!

Credit: Mommy & Me Milestones