What does the toddler understand?
- By now (s)he will understand two steps commands take your shoe off and keep on rack.
- And also understand opposites like hot/cold, stop/go, nice/ugly.(s)he hears ringing of the telephone , door bell and may become excited, get you to answer or tries to answer themselves
What does (s)he speak?
- Your toddler’s vocabulary is going to explode. They seem to have a word for almost everything. Their sentence contains of one, two or three words.
- Speech is probably not very clear, but family members can easily understand them.
- Your toddler loves to hold your attention of what they hear and see.
- They may draw your attention to something by naming it, for an example, Bus, Candy, Big, Hot, Wow, see.
How can I help my child?
- Children learn by imitating adults. Use clear, simple words & sentences what is easy to imitate .Show your interest to their speech. When the child says doggie!!! ; Expand his/her word, Oh yes it’s a doggie, Doggie is running. Doggie says bow bow. It is black. Does Anny love doggie?
- Have his/her help to arrange cloths, toys, food at home. These are what Anny eats put all into this bucket. Foods are here. We will put Anny cloths in this bucket. Teach the child basic function, features and class of objects with examples.
- Encourage the child to increase the length of speech. Which puzzle do you want? Try to give him/her open ended questions than close ended. For e.g. rather than asking Do you want rice? Do you want bread? Ask would you like to eat rice or bread? This will simply limit Yes & No answers.
- Reinforce the child effectively .Positive reinforcement is the key for the successful communication. How good Anny speaks, Thank you Anny, mommy understood.
- Introduce books, picture books, games & activities to expand your child’s vocabulary. Use colorful picture books and name object with the child. And describe the object using a simple sentence. Create the situation to use newly learned words in context. E.g. his is an Apple. Anny eats apple./ Apple is red
- Have the child have the habit of collecting pictures from magazines, books. Help him/her to glue then paste or write the name under each object.