- Provide Opportunities where Help is Needed – There are times when you can set up situations so that children will need to ask for assistance which is likely to encourage communication. Presenting attractive materials that require assistance to operate can encourage children to communicate their need for help from adults and peers. For example, during outside play, you can give a child a bottle of bubbles with the top screwed on too tightly. If the child wants to blow bubbles, he or she will have to ask for your assistance in opening the bottle. Keep in mind that some children may not have the language skills to ask for help. Therefore, it may be necessary for you to model how to ask for help. For example, if you notice a child becoming frustrated because he or she wants to blow bubbles but is unable to open the bottle, you might say, “It looks like you are having difficulty opening the bottle of bubbles. Would you like to ask for help?”
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- Model Desired Response – You can use modeling to demonstrate to children a sound, a word, or language form that they do not yet produce on their own. Modeling can also be used to demonstrate to children what it is they are expected to say or do. You can model appropriate behaviors and language by taking the first turn in a game, correcting an incorrect word pronunciation, or by having a child repeat a grammatically correct sentence. For example, if a child points at a picture of a star and says, “Look! It’s a tar!,” you may reply, “Yes, I see the star. Can you say ‘star?’” This encourages the child to pronounce the word correctly.
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