Hijacking Story Time! What You Can Do to Books to Help Your Child With Speech.

Language therapy can be intimidating for many parents.  It's difficult to know what to do to help your child improve their speech!  I want to introduce a research-based strategy that can be used with a variety of kids that you can customize to your child's specific language goals.

Lets reflect back to the chart on normal development that I posted earlier.  Is your child working on building their core vocabulary, or their first 50 words?  Putting 2, 3, 4, or 5 words together?  Do they struggle with pronouns?  Past tense verbs?  Is/are?  Check on your child's long term IEP goals and you should be able to tell about where they're at and what they are working on.  This will be your "language target" during this week's activity.  You are going to hijack story time this week to model the type of language you want your child to be using.

1.  First thing you will need is a book your child will enjoy.  It can be a new book, or an old favorite.  If your child is old enough to know the words of the story, you may want to pick a new book because we are going to be changing the words.  If that won't bother them, then feel free to use their favorite story. Another great choice for this activity would be a book without words.  If you child isn't really into books, you might try a pop-up or flap book.  They can be a little more interactive and exciting for kids who aren't jazzed about sitting and turning pages.  You can also download a book on your tablet if that holds their interest a bit longer.

2.  Grab some sticky notes or a note pad, and open to the first page.  Take a sip of Dr. Pepper (or your beverage of choice) because things are about to get creative up in here.  Completely ignore any text or the "right words" of the book.

3.  Check out the pictures.  What could these characters be saying or doing that would hit your child's language target?  Maybe the are labeling things they see (working on nouns!).  They may not use any names, and refer to everyone as "he" or "she" (pronoun target!).  They may ask and answer lots of questions, like "who is____" or other wh- questions (another language target).  Write down some dialogue, and turn to page 2.

4.  Repeat the process!

One important tip: GET REPETITIVE.  Use your language target as many times as you can.  Make it borderline annoying!  Young kids need a lot of repetition, and they need even more when they have a delay in language.

Once your story is ready, wait for a time when your child wants to read with you.  If they aren't in the mood, don't force it!  If your kid's thinking about how they want to watch transformers the entire time your reading they will not hear a single word.  Plus, this is good bonding time.  Make it count.

Here is an example book that I have done.  I wanted to show a different target for each page, so you can see that this activity can work for whatever your child is working on!

Her is an example book I did based off of a board book called "You Are My Sunshine."
Each page is focused on a different language target, but make your entire book based on one target.  I just wanted to show a few different examples!

The first is targeting "she."  See what I mean by repetitive?

This next page is targeting wh questions, or spatial locations.  Either one works!

This page is targeting nouns in single words.

This page is targeting answering and asking questions.

I would love to hear how this activity went!  Let me know if you have any questions or want some feedback on your book pages!