Many parents do a superb job of encouraging their child to use language effectively. They help their youngsters learn the mechanics of language simply by filling their child's environment with good language models, by correcting their mistakes in a matter-of-fact manner, and by responding to and praising his efforts.
So receptive is a child to the language he hears around him that he learns to speak it precisely as he hears it, whether it's French, English, Filipino, Chinese, German, or Spanish. In homes where parents are too busy, or too uninterested to provide good models of language for their young children to absorb, the loss is almost impossible to make up later or without great effort. The lack of opportunity to encourage your child to use language effectively during the first few years of life is probably the greatest factor that depresses the learning abilities of disadvantaged children.
Here are some valuable tips made by Helene Goldnadel a life coach, on how you can encourage your child to use language effectively:
1) You don't need to teach your child to talk by drilling her on syllables or phonetics. But you can help her absorb the words she needs most by talking to her casually whenever you are together. For instance, you can help her name the body parts she may not have learned yet as you bathe her - heels, shoulders, knees, chin, thighs, chest. Then, when she already knows them, let her tell you in what order she wants to be scrubbed.
2) You can also describe each article of clothing as you dress her - pink undershirt, red sweater, blue overalls. As your child learns to say these words, you can give her some choice about what clothes she'll wear. When doing groceries, you can ask him to bring you products that he knows and put them inside your cart - paper napkins, bread, cake, crackers.
3) Avoid putting words in your toddler's mouth before he has the chance to say them. There are instances wherein a two or three-year old is unusually slow to talk, and studies show that it's mainly because his parents or siblings are anticipating his needs so completely that the child doesn't feel the urge to speak up for himself and doesn't.
4) Just by carrying on friendly conversations with your toddler, you can supply him with words that he needs to describe his activities, his experiences, and his feelings. For instance, you can comment "Daddy's chin feels scratchy when he needs a shave," or "the dog is making tracks on the kitchen floor because his feet are wet."
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