Strategies

Suggestions for Enriching the Environment

• Design your environment to reflect the diversity of families represented in your program, including their cultures, languages, and family make-up. This can include fabrics, signs, books, photos and posters that portray people involved in real life experiences, and other materials that you can talk with the children about.
• Play CDs of children’s songs from various cultures, while children are playing in centers or interest areas; occasionally sing along and encourage children to join you.
• Provide basic toy phones (which can be purchased or made from plastic PVC pipes and corner joints) that allow children to hear themselves speak, providing immediate feedback.
• Include wordless books to build listening, vocabulary, comprehension, and literacy skills.

Effective Strategies to Support Children’s Development and Learning

• Make sure babies can see or feel your mouth when you hold them. This is particularly important when talking with children with hearing loss. Make sounds or repeat the sounds babies make to encourage back and forth communication.
• Respond to young children when they look at you, cry, smile, coo, say words, and reach or move toward you. Talk to them, pick them up, and imitate their sounds back to them. Show them you enjoy these conversations
• Practice conversational turn-taking with young children through talking, actions, and playing games like “peek-aboo” or other communication games from their culture. Ask family members to teach you some of these games.
• Realize that behaviors such as biting or tantrums may happen because children do not have the words to communicate. Help children relax and give them words and or simple sign language that can help them name and describe their feelings and communicate their needs.
• Take children outdoors to listen to sounds. Encourage children to listen intently and to describe sounds they hear in their environment.
• Use a variety of words when you talk, including labels for things, action words, and many descriptive words. (“Look at the squirrel with the long, fluffy tail! It is running and jumping all over the yard.”)
• When speaking insure tone and facial expression match what is being said. For example, use a serious tone when saying “Hitting hurts. Be kind to friends.
• Encourage children to try out new sounds and words, including words in different languages (family language, school language, and/or other languages). Give children opportunities to play with sounds. Provide experiences with “stretching out” words by saying them slowly sound-bysound.
• Talk with children in a positive tone and speak in an encouraging way about what they are hearing, seeing, feeling, smelling, and tasting. Talk about printed words they see related to those experiences.
• Teach children simple words and phrases in sign language and use with familiar songs and phrases.
• Sings songs, say rhymes, and do finger plays in English and other languages.
• Use transitions between activities such as songs, sign language, and finger plays incorporating actions during transitions are especially helpful for children with limited communication skills.
• Engage children in conversation while at play, snack time, lunch, and during other routines.
• Listen attentively; don’t rush children’s speech. Follow children’s lead in the conversation and show interest by being at the child’s level.
• Use photos of the child doing the routine activities of the day to help those who have difficulty with understanding directions.
• Help children discriminate sounds in spoken language through rhymes, songs, and word games, using various media (e.g., CDs, tablets, computers, smart boards).
• Provide communication devices, such as picture schedules and communication boards that have pictures the child can press or point at to communicate wants and needs.
• Talk about things you are doing and the child is doing (“referred to as mapping your actions.”) Think of interesting words to describe details and actions. For example, if you are pretending to wash dishes, you might talk about scrubbing and scouring. When outside describe what the sounds are as you hear them.
• Provide frequent opportunities for children to talk and listen to each other such as a sharing time, lunch, and snack times using smaller groups to encourage more meaningful conversation.
• Provide opportunities for children to talk in front of a mirror so they can see the movement of their mouth and the sound they are making at the same time.
• Use enjoyable books, poems, rhymes, finger plays, and songs that children can repeat frequently.
• Use facial expressions, gestures, sign language, and a rich and varied vocabulary when speaking and reading with children.
• Give children clear instructions that help them move from simple directions to a more complex sequence. State directions positively, respectfully, carefully, and only as needed.