Natural Voices Speech Therapy

05/11/2024

01/06/2024

Melissa Kauffman

07/08/2023

📢 Getting noisy!

Verbal imitation is an important prelinguistic skill that needs to be established before a child can acquire an abundance of spoken words.

Try starting with these simple vocalizations. Get on the floor and get face to face so that the child can see how your mouth moves as you are making the sounds.

Incorporate sounds into play and match sound effects with actions to make it fun and engaging!

What simple sounds would you add to this list? What are your favorites?

07/08/2023

🎬 Actions before sounds, sounds before words.

Children learn how to say words through imitation! Imitating actions is an important first step on the path toward those first spoken words!

Make it fun and keep it simple. Keep the child's play skills in mind and make sure you are asking them to imitate actions in play that are at their current ability level!

The examples above are all simple actions you can try with any child in the exploratory phase of play (six months and up).

An example of asking a child to imitate a skill that isn't in their play repertoire yet would be asking a child in the exploratory phase of play to drive a car on the floor or put a peg in a board (which are examples of functional and relational play skills). For more information on play development, check out my instagram guide on Play!

07/08/2023

❤️🎉

04/28/2023

03/15/2023

A new study suggests the rise in mental health disorders in children and teens is attributed to a decline over decades in opportunities for them to play, roam and engage in activities independent of direct oversight and control by adults. Although well intended, adults' drive to guide and protect ch...

03/01/2023

Do the voices!! ❤️

03/01/2023

Play provides the primary foundation for learning, exploring, problem-solving, and building an overall understanding of the world!! 🌱