International Ask a Question Day
March 14, 2010 at 6:55 AM | Posted in Language | 2 CommentsTags: online speech therapy, questions, speech therapy
March 14th is International Ask a Question Day. The goal of this day is to help people understand the benefits of asking more questions and how to ask better questions.
There are 12 main reasons to ask questions, they include:
1) to gather information
2) to maintain relationships
3) to learn and to teach
4) to build awareness
5) to think clearly, critically and strategically
6) to solve problems and to make decisions
7) to challenge assumptions
8) to set and accomplish goals
9) to clarify and confirm in listening sitautions
10) to resolve conflicts
11) to engage in production conversations
12) to create and innovate new possibilities
To ask effective questions we need to practice our questioning skills. Here are a few ideas that can help you work on your questioning skills.
Look at the 12 reasons to ask questions and pick one to work on each day or each week. Then practicing asking questions in that category. Try asking these questions to different people in different situations. When you use these skills in different situations it helps you become more efficient, more adept at the skill in question. You can also try to ask yourself these questions to help you practice.
Keep a daily journal of things that happen in your life and the world around you. A good observer has many things to ask questions about as they are engaged and thinking critically about the world around them and things occurring in their daily lives. Writing down these observations may spark a question you can ask someone else or research for yourself.
Remember that questioning is the way we learn new things. We have all been around the three-year-old who constantly asks “why?” They are not trying to frustrate anyone they are merely trying to learn more about their environment and the actions of the people around them. This curiosity is a valuable tool that should be nurtured as it will help them throughout their educational career.
Some children struggle with asking questions both in how to formulate the question and asking appropriate questions. Children often ask questions that don’t give them the answer or information they were looking for which leaves them feeling frustrated. Children may ask questions that do not fit in with the current conversation they may ask questions in a manner which confuses the listener so they are unsure of what information the child is trying to obtain.
We should also look at the flip side of this and mention answering questions. Answering questions is also challenging to many children. They may not understand what information the asker is looking for thus they do not appropriately answer the question. They may answer the first part of the question but not second part, etc.
Speech therapy can help children learn how ask meaningful, appropriate questions that get them the information the want or need. a child who is skilled at asking questions is more likely to ask questions when they are confused or when they missed some information or to check to ensure they understood what had been said. Speech therapy also helps children learn how to listen to the question so they are able to effectively answer the posed question. This is a skill children need to succeed in school as children are graded on their ability to answer questions on written and oral examinations.
If you have concerns about your child’s ability to ask or answer questions effectively or appropriately please contact a local speech pathologist or one of our speech pathologists at 1-877-480-7913 or through our website by clicking on the link below:
Online Speech Therapy provided by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
National Grammar Day
March 4, 2010 at 5:46 AM | Posted in Language | 4 CommentsTags: grammar, online speech therapy, speech therapy
March 4th is national grammar day. It is sponsored by The Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar. You may be wondering why is good grammar so important that it needs its own day? Well, grammar is the rules of our language. It tells us how to form words such as past tense and how to form sentences so they make sense. Proper grammar helps us to communicate easily and effectively with each other. When someone uses poor grammar or word choice they can convey a completely different message than they intended.
Most of us have experienced a communication breakdown when someone uses slang and/or poor grammar. You look at them having no idea what message they were trying to get across. We can reduce these situations by teaching good grammar skills. We will never eliminate the use of slang and some of these terms become so widely used and accepted they can be found in the dictionary. For example, the word “cool” has a definition listed as slang on dictionary.com with the following definitions:
1) great; fine; excellent: a real cool comic
2) characterized by great facility; highly skilled or clever: cool maneuvers on the parallel bars.
3) socially adept: It’s not cool to arrive at a party too early
Speech therapy can help those who show deficits in grammar. Children learn the skills they need to develop accurate sentences in both spoken and written language. Therapy may target word order (making sure the words are in the correct order to convey the intended message), subject-verb agreement (what is singular and what is plural), understanding and using tenses such as past present and future tense as well as present progressive, it can address how and when to use conjunctions. It can work on pronouns, plurals, prefixes and suffixes…the list goes on and on! The areas that are addressed in therapy are determined through the completion of an assessment that looks at what grammar skills the child has and what skills they are lacking. This assessment is usually completed in two ways, standardized (comparing their response to other children their age) and informally through language and writing samples to see type and frequency of errors made in general conversational speech and normal writing activities.
Grammar also helps us improve our overall message through the use of adjectives and adverbs. I can say “I saw a duck.” which clearly gets my message across but by adding adjectives, I can painted a more vivid picture for my listener, “I saw a fluffy, yellow baby duck.” This second sentence provides so much more information and allows the listener to form an accurate picture of what I saw, just by adding a few descriptive adjectives.
There are fun ways to work on grammar skills at home such as the School House Rock, Grammar series that has memorable titles such as Conjunction Junction and Noun is a Person, Place or Thing. These are fun, musical ways to learn about grammar skills.
You can play games online that work on grammar skills such as Grammar Gorillas by Funbrain or the Word Play activities on Pitara. These are just two of the many site out there offering online games for kids to work on grammar skills. You can also find activities at stores that sell coloring books, they often have activity books that work on various grammar skills. These are useful tools for teaching grammar skills to those who are currently learning them. If your child is struggling with grammar skills they may have an underlying language delay or disorder and would therefore benefit from speech therapy designed to target these skills.
If you have concerns about your child’s grammar skills please contact a local speech pathologist or one of our speech pathologists by phone at 1-877-480-7913 or through our website by clicking on the link below.
Online Speech Therapy provided by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
American Crossword Puzzle Week
February 26, 2010 at 7:08 AM | Posted in Language | 1 CommentTags: cognitive functioning, langauge skills, online speech therapy, speech therapy
February 26th kicks off American Crossword Puzzle Week. This is a week designed to celebrate crossword puzzles. Crossword puzzles are a fantastic way to build language skills. When completing a crossword puzzle you are working on vocabulary skills, word play skills, language memory skills, drawing on past experiences, simple reading comprehension skills, etc.
Our brains are able to grow and adapt throughout our lives. It has been said that those who experience memory or motor skill decline as they age is a result of inactivity. It boils down to that old saying “use it or lose it”. So what can you to do avoid this fate? Exercise your brain! An excellent way to do this is to complete crossword puzzles! This mental stimulation helps to improve your brains overall functioning and helps prevent a decline in cognitive functioning.
Work out those mental muscles and try a crossword puzzle today!
Try some puzzles for adults:
http://www.boatloadpuzzles.com/playcrossword
Crossword puzzles for kids:
http://www.puzzlechoice.com/pc/Crossword_Menx.html
http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/student-crossword-archive/
These are just a few websites that offer free online crossword puzzles. You are also able to find crossword puzzles in your daily newspaper or you can find a crossword puzzle book at a convenience store, book store, etc. Find fun puzzles that you will enjoy and get some good brain exercise to boot!
Online Speech Therapy provided by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
Is There a Speech Delay?
February 21, 2010 at 4:30 AM | Posted in Language | 1 CommentTags: online speech therapy, speech delay, speech therapy
An article written by Perri Klass, M.D. recently published in the NY Times discussed the ways parents and pediatricians consider speech delays.
If you have a young child no doubt you have had the basic discussion with your pediatrician about your child’s speech development. The pediatrician asks simple questions like; how many words can they say? Can they combine two words into phrases or short sentences? Can other people understand them?
While these may seem like easy questions, really take the time to think about the answers. The earlier a speech delay is identified the earlier the child can receive therapy. Many believe early intervention is key to helping these children develop the speech skills they need.
If you aren’t sure what your child should be saying (or understanding) you can find guidelines on the American Speech-Language and Hearing Association website here: asha.org/public/speech/development/chart.htm.
Communication begins early in life. During the first year, children begin to understand things they hear. As they reach their first birthday children begin to say their first words. Between one and two they begin to follow simple commands such as pointing to body parts and will enjoy listening to stories. As they reach their second birthday, they start combing two word together to make phrases like “more milk” and continue to expand until three where they are using short sentences of 3 words or more.
Concerns in regards to a speech delay may lead to the diagnosis of other delays. Speech delays can be early indicators for things like Autism where many (though not all) children with Autism experience speech delays.
Pediatricians are beginning to take these concerns more seriously. Parents aren’t hearing the “wait and see” things they used to such as boys talk later than girls, younger siblings talk later, etc. While these things may attribute to variation between children they are not a reason why children shouldn’t meet the developmental milestones.
So, what are some simple things to do at home with your toddler? Talk to them. Use real words and real speech patterns (not baby talk). Read to them as often as they will let you. Get excited when they talk to you, meet their requests quickly (when possible) and with excitement and explanation, for example, if the child says “more drink” say things like “sure, I will get you more drink because you asked so nicely.” or “thank you for telling me you need more drink, let me get it for you.” This may help the child relate them speaking to getting what they want sparking the desire to communicate more. Then listen when they talk, it may take a little detective work to figure out what they are saying at first but take the time to show you are interested in what they have to say by listening and commenting about what they are telling you.
If you do have concerns talk with your pediatrician or contact a speech-language pathologist who can give you more information specific to your child and are able to evaluate your child’s speech and language skills.
Online Speech Therapy provided by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
National Hobby Month
February 10, 2010 at 4:50 AM | Posted in Language | Leave a commentTags: online speech therapy, pragmatic language, social skills, speech therapy, telepractice
February is National Hobby Month, though some sites say it is in January, either way this is a great opportunity to begin a new hobby or spend some time working on an old one. With our busy lives, hobbies often take a back seat to other daily tasks. We should set aside some time to enjoy our favorite hobbies and this month gives us the perfect reason. It is also a great opportunity to encourage our children to develop hobbies. The best way to do this is to let them try a variety of things to see what they like best. They may want to try an art class, join Girl or Boy Scouts, enroll in a gymnastics class or try something on their own like collecting something or a craft like knitting. Be open to their ideas, they may have heard about something in school or on TV and are interested. Encourage this by learning more about it together by searching on the internet or reading about it at the local library or book store. If they are still interested, look for local clubs or groups they can join.
These groups provide an excellent way to work on social skills while learning new things. Children are able to interact with others who share their interests and having that common interest can reduce some of the uncertainty people feel when interacting with new people. In this situation, they have something they can easily talk about and can work on questioning, turn taking, topic maintenance, eye contact, personal space, etc. while engaging in this group.
They can build their confidence and self-esteem as they become more proficient or master a task they have been working on for awhile. These experiences also help children develop their language skills as they are learning new things which tends to involve learning new vocabulary, they are gaining good experiences they can draw on when reading or writing on various topics…the list goes on and on.
Use this month to try a new hobby or dust off an old one. Find a class or group that will help you learn more and allow for some socialization. You and your child will feel good about the experience, learn something new and maybe even make a new friend.
Online Speech Therapy provided by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
Why do kids get bullied?
February 8, 2010 at 6:45 AM | Posted in Language | 4 CommentsTags: bullying, online speech therapy, pragamatic langauge, social interaction skills, speech therapy
A recent article found in Yahoo! News helps explain why some children get bullied or picked on more than others. This article titled “Studies Reveal Why Kids get Bullied and Rejected” was written by Robin Nixon a LiveScience Contributor. Approximately 10-13% of children go through rejections by their peers during their school years.
This article determined that there are three main reasons children get picked on or rejected by their peers. These factors all relate to a child’s ability (or lack there of) to read social cues. So why is bullying such a concern is that it can lead to mental problems, poor grades, lead to the child dropping out of school or developing substance abuse problems.
The way children learn to interact as children will affect their relationships throughout their lives. Kids tend to make mistakes initially out of naivety. They are unsure of the proper thing to do or the social rules for the specific situation.
The kids who have “social problems” are having trouble with pragmatic issues. They are having difficulty reading non-verbal cues or problem solving in social situations. These children need to be taught these social cues and rules for various types of interactions. Parents, teachers and others in the child’s life need to identify if the child is struggling with social skills (pragmatics) and if so, the child may benefit from speech therapy designed to address these skills. There are many skills and strategies that the child can learn to help them improve their social interaction skills. For more information please contact a speech pathologist in your area or one of our speech pathologists by phone at 877-480-7913 or e-mail at info@independentspeech.com (you can use our contact us page as well by clicking here).
Online Speech therapy provided by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
National Bake for Family Fun Month
February 3, 2010 at 6:58 AM | Posted in 1, Language | 1 CommentTags: online speech therapy, speech pathologist, speech therapy
February is Bake for Family Fun Month. While this is a fun way to spend some quality time with your child, it is also a great way to work on speech-language skills. This post will show you how to incorporate speech-language skills into a baking activity.
First, choose a recipe that is easy to make. It really doesn’t matter what recipe you choose. For the purpose of this example, I am going to use a recipe for No Bake Play dough. This is a fun recipe to use because you get to have fun making it and then playing with it when you are finished! (This is the actual recipe so feel free to try it out for yourself!)
Once you choose which recipe you are going to use, print or write out all the ingredients and instructions. Next, read the recipe together. Reading through it before getting started will help to ensure you don’t miss any steps or ingredients along the way. After you have read it, collect all the ingredients. To check for memory skills, see how many ingredients your child can get without looking at the recipe again.
For my example recipe, I need :
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 cup hot water
- 1/2 cup salt
- Food Coloring
It would also be helpful to get ready a bowl, measuring cups and cookie cutters because those are the utensils that I will need to make this recipe.
My first step says to: Combine flour and salt and then pour in the hot water. Before you begin this step, you can do a vocabulary check…what does combine mean? This is a two-step direction. Ask the child what needs to be done, check for understanding of the two distinct parts. This is also a great opportunity to check for understanding of quantity. Which measuring cup should you use for each ingredient? Which ingredient do you use the most of? Which ingredients use the same amount?
Then add in the food coloring. You can add in any color, remember the more drops of food coloring, the darker the color. Again, a good opportunity to discuss quantity. you can read the back of the food coloring box which will tell you how to mix the provided colors to make new colors such as orange or purple. If you choose one of these mixtures you can discuss how many drops of each color, which color need more drops, which color needed fewer drops, etc.
The next step in my recipe is to knead the ingredients until it forms a dough. Here is another good vocabulary word…what does knead mean? Kids love this part because they get to get their hands into this mess and knead it until it becomes play dough. This is a good opportunity to work on descriptive words. How does this feel? Is it hot/cold, stick/slimy/gooey? Encourage them to be very descriptive, see how many descriptive words they can use to talk about the dough they are kneading.
The last part is to play! Now you can make things out of the play dough. Here is another good opportunity to work on descriptive concepts. What can they make, have them describe what they are doing. They can tell you so you can make one two or you can make something without the other person watching and have them ask questions until they guess what you have made.
Finally, store this play dough in an air tight container so you can use it later!
Any recipe you choose will have these basic steps. So you can work on these skills with any recipe. For example, if it is a cookie recipe then the child can describe how they taste…
Have fun baking (and working on those speech-language skills) this month!
Online Speech Therapy by Independent Speech ~ www.independentspeech.com
No Interruptions Day
December 31, 2009 at 8:11 AM | Posted in Language | Leave a commentTags: online speech therapy, pragmatics, social skills, speech therapy, telepractice
Having a nice conversation.
December 31st is “No Interruptions Day”. Interruptions occur when someone begins talking in the middle of our sentence. Knowing when to speak and when to wait for your turn is one important communication skill in the area of pragmatics. So, what are pragmatics? Pragmatics are social interaction skills or the rules of conversation. There are three main communication skills involved in pragmatics.
These are:
1) Using language for a variety of purposes.
The way we word a sentence changes its purpose. For example, if a person says “I am going to read a book”, this sentence is meant to inform the listener. Whereas if they say “read me a book”, they are demanding the listener to do something but by adding the simple word “please” to this sentence they change the command to a request, “please read me a book.”
2) Changing the way you talk based on your listener/situation.
This relates to the vocabulary and tone we use. We would not use the same words with a toddler as we would with an adult. We make adjustments in our word choice and sentence structure to help our listener understand our message. In addition, we would not speak the same way in a library as we would at a football game.
3) Following conversational rules
These are social rules such as taking turns, maintaining eye contact, understanding facial expressions and gestures, respecting personal space, maintaining the topic of conversation, etc. These are the rules that help us have effective, enjoyable conversations with others. There are many rules and they vary based on the individual’s culture.
There are many things you can do to help a child who is struggling with pragmatic skills. Below you will find some ideas you can use to help:
1) Help the child learn to use different language forms. For example, if they tend to “demand” things practice asking for things. Talk them through how to change their sentence by modeling what they could say.
2) Role play conversations with different partners or in different situations. This is easy to work on during pretend play. If the child is talking to a baby doll, or pretending to be a teacher, you can use these situations to demonstrate how we communicate differently with different people and in different situations.
3) Make a game of understanding facial expressions and gestures. You can have them guess how you are feeling or saying by your gestures and facial expressions alone (without the aid of words).
4) Read stories that highlight various social skills. For example, the Berenstain series which has many books about social skills such as “Forget their Manners, or “Too Much Teasing”. There is another series called the “Let’s Talk About Series” by Joy Wilt Berry that has titles such as “Interrupting” and “Let’s Talk About Saying No” (you can find both of these series on Amazon.com).
5) Provide many opportunities for your child to engage a variety of different people in different situations. Try new things and go new places, each new experience helps your child learn.
Some children benefit from attending speech-therapy to help learn the many intricacies of social language. If you have concerns about your child’s pragmatic skills contact a speech pathologist who can conduct an evaluation to better understand your child’s specific needs.
www.independentspeech.com – Online Speech Therapy by Independent Speech
National Thank You Note Day
December 26, 2009 at 7:38 AM | Posted in Interesting Information, Language | Leave a commentTags: online speech therapy, speech therapy, thank you note, writing skills
It seems fitting that December 26th is National Thank You Note day. After receiving all those gifts over the holidays it is time to show your appreciation. This note is a nice gesture to thank the person for thinking of you and taking the time to choose the gift. Not only is sending a thank you note “good manners” but for many it is also confirmation that you received the gift as many send gifts and cards are sent through the mail. While there is a standard formula to a thank you note, you do not have to stick to this. Be creative, especially when it comes to helping children send thank you notes. Have them draw a picture of the gift, have them color the outside of the card and you write the note within, or take a picture of them holding the gift. For older children, have them write their own thank you notes. Not only will this help teach them manners and appreciation but will brighten the day of the recipient as the child took the time to write out the note themselves. Try to make it fun, rather than a chore. Find fun paper (you don’t have to use standard thank you notes), pick out some stickers,and/or use pens with different colored ink. For those learning to type, find some great e-greetings and have them send out their thank you notes electronically.
This provides another great opportunity to work on writing skills for older children. They should check to make sure they have used good mechanics such as spelling and punctuation and good sentence structure. They also have another chance to practice writing out an envelope and placing everything in the correct location.
Working on these skills in a functional way (they will need to send out thank you notes their entire lives) helps to show them that these are important skills that they will need in their everyday lives; we have all heard the question, “When am I ever going to use this?”. Showing them how good writing skills are needed for everyday activities, like writing out thank you notes, answers this question!
Write to a Friend Month
December 8, 2009 at 12:10 PM | Posted in Language | Leave a commentTags: online speech therapy, speech therapy, writing
December is “Write to a Friend” month. The intention is to help us connect with friends (and family too) that we may have lost touch with during the past year. This is also a great opportunity to sit down and work on letter writing skills. Most correspondence is done via e-mail these days and the rules for writing an e-mail are nothing like a traditional letter. Most people do not worry about proper structure of an e-mail but it is a skill we all need when it comes time to write a letter.
Think of someone you would like to reconnect with and then get out paper and pen (or pencil). Have your child write a
letter of their own to a friend or family member. When writing the letter think about the structure of the letter and help
your child include all the parts of the letter such as the heading and signature. You may want to talk about what to include
in the body of the letter, help them think about some of the things that they have recently done, or exciting things that are coming up.
For very young children, they can draw a picture to be included in your letter with a short sentence or two describing their picture or saying “hello” to the person you are writing to.
Once you have decided the letter is ready to go, you must write out the envelope making sure to get everything in the right place and legible so the mail carrier can read it.
When the person goes to their mailbox and finds the letter, it will make their day. It is always fun to get a letter in the mail
(as most of us usually get bills and junk mail). Hopefully, they sit down and write a letter back to you so you have something
fun to find in your mailbox soon!
www.independentspeech.com – Online Speech Therapy by Independent Speech
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