Literacy Spot #8: Speech Development Through Conversation

ByChristie Burnett

When Immy was a baby I talked to her a lot – just general chatter about everyday things; things we were doing, people we were seeing, events happening around us when we were out and about. This continued through toddlerhood and even now she is three, Immy and I continue to talk about these same sorts of things all throughout the day.  Where once her responses were smiles and gurgles, which grew into word approximations, then single word responses, I love that we are now actually able to have a two way conversation.

Conversation is importance to speech development (and therefore literacy) as it helps to develop a child’s ability to express their own ideas, understandings and feelings, and improves their general fluency in verbal interaction. Socially, being able to converse with other children and adults has many obvious benefits.

How can we encourage conversation with our children?

Take advantage of everyday opportunities to just talk together without the distraction of things like television or radio. For example;

  • Try turning the radio off and talking whilst you are sitting in the car.  You might talk about where you are going or what your child enjoyed on the outing you have just finished, as well as things that you see as you are driving along.
  • Sitting down as a family at mealtimes not only allows your young child to engage in conversation but to also observe adults talking to each other and/or to older children and this type of modelling is very valuable to the process of learning the social conventions of conversation. For example, I have always asked Dad 101 about his day at work and now not long after we sit down to dinner Immy usually asks, “How was work today? Did you have any meetings?” and continues with questions like, “Who was your meeting with?”

Think about how you talk with your child. Do you ask questions which elicit a one word response like “Yes” or “No,” or do you ask questions which encourage your child to use sentences to reply? (see examples of asking ‘good’ questions in this post) Do you show interest in your child’s contributions and try to prolong the conversation?

Reflect and talk about real life experiences you have enjoyed together. For example, if you visited the zoo, revisit the experience by talking about it together in the following days. Look at photographs or use art materials to encourage your child to express their thoughts and memories.

Actively listen to your child. Don’t be so busy talking that they do not have the chance to respond.

Use your time reading together to talk too. Talk about the story – ask what your child might do if he were the character facing the dilemma in the book, or ask him/her what is her favourite part of the story and why (see more information about talking to children about books here and here).

Incorporate conversation into your child’s play by;

  • Providing an old telephone and/or mobile phone for your child’s use during imaginative play
  • Using finger puppets or hand puppets and role play conversation between the characters
What is Childhood 101′s Literacy Spot? It is a weekly reminder of the importance of young children learning playfully as each week I share one idea for playing around with literacy, taken from my many years working as an early childhood teacher. Visit the previous Literacy Spot posts for more fun ideas for playing with literacy.

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Christie Burnett is a teacher, presenter, writer and the mother of two. She created Childhood 101 as a place for teachers and parents to access engaging, high quality learning ideas.

9 Comments

  1. I talk to my children a lot, partly because I know how important this is but mostly because this is my nature so it comes easily to me! As we live down in Margaret River we seem to spend a lot of time driving and so I agree that the car is a great place for conversation – I have read that even as children get older, teenager years included, that the car is a great place to talk as it has a nice relaxed feel about it…

    At the moment, my toddler is most interested in road signs, so our conversation revolves around this, at first I found it tedious but it has become almost a game….like spotto, but instead of yellow VW’s we are looking for stop signs!

    1. It comes naturally to me too, Gill. And we have been through a road sign phase as well!

  2. I too have talked to my daughter Grace since she was a baby – babbling on about things we were doing, could see etc. (I think that’s the teacher in us!!) I think this is one of the reasons why Grace is so chatty now though. You have created a great list of suggestions above.

  3. We’re all talkers at my house! Our best conversations are during any car journey and, my favourite, when I’m putting the children to bed. We each have a chat about our favourite part of the day and what our plans are for tomorrow. x

  4. One of the hardest things about my sons ASD diagnosis is this lack of conversation. His speech/lang/communication limited especially in this area 2-way reciprocal chat. Much of the speech he does have is rote learnt off books/TV/computer games or echolalia (repeating back your question or stock phrases). Can be amusing at times (his current is when asked if he wants something to say “Tiggers dont like honey” or “No i dont like honey_ in place of No thankyou or I dont want it (eg Gus its time for a bath, or lets go get Ella from school etc) as thats what Tigger says in on of his favourite Pooh movies. It IS getting better and I hope will continue to improve. Would LOVE to be able to have an actual real meaningful two way conversation with him though.

    1. I’m With Michele here. Heidi will have whole conversations where she makes cat meows or growls instead of talking. Currently she is repeating the linefrom Megamind a lot ‘I got my butt kicked pretty good.’ so I figure if you can’t beat them join them and mimic back her sounds/words. We dohave our conversation moments too, the last couple of months have seen a huge leap in heidis language skills which is awesome.

      Annie was having reasons arguments with her dad by 18months, she can and has talked underwater – drives her swimming teacher nuts 🙂

  5. LOVE finger puppets, and phones. plus modelling dinner table conversation

  6. Thanks for another great post, Christie! A link will be in the March 1 issue of Parenting News You Can Use, our free weekly e-zine. Your readers can subscribe at http://www.WholeHeartedParenting.com. Talking with our children also gives them social cues about listening, pausing, inflection and tone.

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