One of my fondest memories as a child was reading books with my mother; without even realising it, our reading adventures had a positive impact on my language and literacy development. It is not an unknown fact that reading to your children from an early age can influence their literacy and language development, but what exact skills do children develop during this time? And what can parents do to further encourage the development of these skills?

Reading with your young child can lead to print motivation, vocabulary development, phonological awareness, print awareness, and narrative skills.

Print motivation

Print motivation refers to a child’s interest in books, their ability to attend to books and the child themselves taking the initiative to try to read. Research has shown that the more you as parents are interested in reading to your child, the more your child with request to be read to.

Vocabulary development

Parent-child book reading interaction provides opportunities to develop your child’s vocabulary by using their current word knowledge to learn the meanings of new words. While reading with your child you as a parent use strategies to develop their vocabulary without even realising it! Strategies used include repetition and elaboration of words ,defining words or providing synonym, initiating role-play, pointing to a picture related to the new word or using the word in another sentence.

Phonological awareness

Phonological awareness involves understanding that language is made up of different sound units, syllables, and rhymes, and the ability to manipulate these units; for example, you need phonological awareness skills to sound out and blend words together. Having adequate phonological awareness skills can lead to the effective development of reading and spelling skills. You can promote phonological skills by engaging in listening games, nursery rhymes and reading of books containing nursery rhyme, alliteration, clapping or tapping out word syllables.

Print awareness

Print awareness is the awareness of print and the knowledge of its function. It refers to skills such as alphabet knowledge, the understanding that print carries meaning, the awareness of print in books and the environment, and the ability to use books accurately and understand its format.

You can encourage print awareness by asking questions about print, commenting on the print as well as using your finger or your child’s finger to tracking along print lines. Print awareness is not only encouraged through books, it can also be taught via the child’s environment. You should point out print that can be seen in traffic and store signs.

Narrative skills

Narrative skills involve understanding the nature of stories and the way in which they are constructed. Knowledge of the structure of stories is important, because most of the materials used to teach reading to young children are structured in narrative form. Reading and re-reading storybooks aloud to your child is one of the best ways to build a sense of story and to develop an understanding of story structure. By taking on the role of active listener, asking questions, adding information and prompting your child to elaborate more on the description of the material in the book, you are encouraging the development if their narrative skills.

I hope this article has made you excited about reading with your child! Always remember the more excited you are, the more likely your child will love books and who doesn’t want their child to love reading!

My previous article briefly describes a few prelinguistic skills that children acquire at a young age. These skills are necessary in-order for children to develop spoken language; one very important skill is vocalization. Most of the time children learn to crawl before walking and it is no different for language development; children need to produce plenty of vocalizations before they will start using real words. I am going to give you a few tips on how you can encourage your child to be more vocal very early on in their life.  The best thing to do is just talk, keep on talking, and talk some more! Its sounds so simple and it is! Just because your child may not understand you and is not able to respond verbally doesn’t mean that they are not listening and absorbing everything you are saying! Singing is another way you can encourage your child to vocalize.  I particularly don’t like the sound of my own voice when singing in therapy sessions but children don’t care what you sound like they just love to listen and if you lucky they will join in! One of the best ways you can encourage your child to vocalize is by imitation; repeat whatever your child say, for example: your child says, “papapa” you then respond with “papapa”. Continue to imitate your child’s vocalization for several turns if you can,  essential you might just have your “first conversation” with them!. Exposing your child to easy words are also a good way to increase babbling patterns ; easy words include animal sounds like “moo-moo” or “baa-baa” and transport noises like “hum-hum” and “beep-beep”. I hope you enjoyed these tips and remember it is never too early to help develop your child’s language!

“My child is too young to talk, they don’t need speech therapy”, I have heard this statement too many times to count!  I understand where parents who think this way are coming from. Why would you be worried about language development if your child is not expected to talk yet at their age?

Well, In actual fact it might be the best time for your child to receive speech therapy; research has shown that early identification and treatment results in better outcomes for children who go on to develop language and speech difficulties. Children who are ‘late talkers’ often present with difficulties at school that could be lessened and sometimes completely avoided just by early intervention.

So how as a parent are you supposed to know if your child needs therapy prior to language acquisition? Well you can take note of your child’s prelinguistic skills; these are the skills that are acquired prior to spoken language and can be a good indicator of possible future delays in language, cognition, and communication. There are several prelinguistic skills but I am going to discuss only a few of these skills very briefly:

1.       Turn-taking

This is your child’s ability to take turns when playing with you as well as share their toys; for examples: when you child builds a tower, do they allow you to take a turn or do they want to be the only one allowed to place the blocks on top of each other.  This skill should be almost fully developed at 12 months.

2.       Communicative intent

How does your child express their needs and wants to you?  Do they just ignore you and grab what they want or do they point or gesture or verbalize.  Between 10-12 months, children use gestures with verbalizations to request.

3.       Eye contact

Eye contact is one of the earliest forms of communication; children should be able to maintain eye contact around 4-6 months.

4.       Vocalizations

Vocalizations are the early sounds that children make before using real words.  Between 3-6 months, children start to coo, this is random vowel sounds; they also start to blow raspberries, these are quite fun to imitate the babies as they create motor humming sound.  Between 7 to 9 months, children start to babble by producing sounds like “papa’” and “baba”. Between 10-12 month children use many different strings of nonsenses syllables when babbling. Vocalizations are a very important part of language development.

If you feel your child is delayed in terms of prelinguistic skills, it is important to seek advice from a qualified speech- language therapist. Early intervention can make all the difference for your child’s development.