Talking Top Tips #3!
Date: 15th Nov 2021 @ 4:12pm
Hello all! This is the third installment of our Talking Top Tips blog series. So far we have shared the importance of getting your child’s attention before you speak to them and some ways you can help to develop and broaden your child’s vocabulary.
Today’s ‘Top Tip’ is all about questions.
How many bricks are in your tower? What have you drawn? You like to ride the bike, don’t you? What would happen if we added blue powder to the paint? Are you ok? Do you need a snack?
Both at home and at school children are asked an awful lot of questions! Questions can put children on the defensive and often lead to your child saying or doing less, rather than more. Before diving into questioning, it is important to OWL. This means to observe what your child is doing, wait to see what it is they are interested in and if they initiate a conversation with you through either talking, gesture or by looking at you and listening rather than thinking about what it is you are going to say next. I find waiting to be the most difficult part of ‘owling’!
Once your child has given you a cue to start a conversation (by looking at you or perhaps by showing you a toy), try to simply comment rather than question. If your child holds up a toy tractor, rather than asking ‘What do you have there?’, try ‘Oh look, you have the red tractor!’ Instead of ‘Do you like your juice?’, try ‘Wow! That juice looks delicious!’ Instead of ‘What is that? Is it a bus?’ try ‘That bus looks like it has a lot of passengers today!’
Research indicates that the best way to support young children’s language development is to make 4 comments to every 1 question you ask. This means we need to think really carefully about which questions are important! Try to use questions that match you child’s interests, questions that they would want to answer. It is also worth thinking about questions which require a longer response. For example, asking ‘How are you feeling?’ instead of ‘Are you ok?’ or ‘What can you hear outside?’ over ‘Did you hear the police car?’ There is more information about questions if you are interested to find out more at https://www.famly.co/blog/open-ended-questions-early-years.
Have a go this week at commenting rather than questioning when you are talking with your child! As always if you have any questions, comments or concerns, please get in touch.
Miss Wilkinson.