Children need to hear words lots and lots of times before they attempt to say them. You can help your child by naming things that he or she shows interest in and by repeating that word several times in different ways, e.g. ‘more juice’, ‘juice gone’, ‘lovely juice!’. It is important to remember not to put too much pressure on your child to talk. Children will usually talk when they are able to and they are not just being lazy. Try to reduce the amount of questions that you ask and use comments instead, for example, instead of saying ‘what’s that?’ say ‘look, a bus!’. Young children are interested in what’s happening here and now. Talk about things around you that you can see, hear, smell or touch. This will help in learning the names of things while you look at them together.
If you have concerns regarding your child’s spoken language development see our 'Activities, Ideas and Info' section. Discuss your concerns with your health visitor or the staff at your child’s setting/school who may also have helpful suggestions. If you would like an assessment of your child's speech and language we would be happy to see you.
If your child is a pre-schooler please come along to one of our drop-in sessions. If your child is at school you can ask his or her teacher to refer to us (see our 'referral' section for details).
Alternatively, you could visit your local children’s centre and find out when the speech and language therapist is next in so you can chat to her.