Toys and books to help with speech delay?

Question

I am going to be a nanny for a 2.5 year old with a speech delay. He receives speech therapy weekly and has exercises to do at home, but I am interested in learning about other things that have encouraged speech development in children with speech delays. I have a babys first dictionary with pictures of all sorts of common things we can look at, as well as books with lots of textures. What are some other toys, books, and activities that you can reccomend?

Answer 1

The best thing to do is ask the speech therapist for recommendations.  There are many different types of speec issues.  Articulation, word recall, pragmatics, semantics, receptive, expressive, etc.  So the speech therapist should know what areas he is delayed in and give you suggestions.  But be watchful on this child.  I would read up about autism just to make sure he doesn't have any signs of it.  You can check this out for help:  http://www.valleysnafu.com/SAMPLE%20DSM....

I am here to help.  You can email me at [e-mail]

Answer 2

Literally any toy or activity can be used as a therapy tool.  The most important aspect is the language you as the adult use with him.  Talk about what you're doing, what he's doing, what is going on in the world around him.  Talk, talk, talk!!!  The idea is to provide him as language-rich of an environment as possible.

Young children frequently have a hard time making the connection between pictures in a book and items in real life, so while it's wonderful that you want to expose him to books, they may or may not be effective for him.  Brightly colored toys, child-size household items (dolls, pretend food, etc.), cars & trucks, animals... anything that he can use to create a story or scene would be great.  You want to give him the opportunity to make his own games and play rather than hand him an automatic toy that "plays" for him.

When working with a child who has a speech disorder, it is tempting to try to correct every mis-spoken sound that comes out of his mouth.  This can become very frustrating for him and can actually work against the entire therapy process.  Be sure to communicate with the speech pathologist about what sounds or patterns are being currently targeted in therapy and support those targets.  Choose one or two times a day that you will specifically encourage better speech, like during dinner or when in the car.  During the rest of the day just model good speech skills, but try not to nag the little guy at the risk of causing a lot of unnecessary frustration.

Best of luck & I applaud you for trying to help out your newest charge in every way possible!

Answer 3

Talk to him as much as possible (a language rich environment) and encourage him to speak, too.  Try not to give in to pointing to items when he could make an attempt to say the word.  If you are the one taking him to therapy, talk to the therapist about what she would recommend for you to do.  His specific issues could be more biological based than enivorment based (especially if he's an adoptee).   The biggest thing to stay away from would be television.  Television shuts a child up more than any other "toy."

Answer 4

The principal tenet of early intervention is to "reiterate the sequence of normal development". What this means is you teach the child forward from his level of functioning. For example, if his functioning is at the same level as a normal 18-month-old, that's the level at which the intervention begins.

Find out the age level at which he is functioning, and read up on the speech and language development expectations for that age group. Ask the parents what he's working on in therapy.

You can't contact the therapist yourself because of confidentiality laws, but you can certainly reinforce what she is working on.

Answer 5

basically, anything that interests the child and stimulates language.

If the child is not interested-he will not be motivated to talk-

higher end toy stores and parent/teacher type stores have many things-

toys r us has some-but they are also mixed with 'bells and whistles' toys that are more technology than play and not at stimulating-

Books, puzzles, coloring, car play can all incorporate speech-the important thing is to infuse language into child directed activities

Toys R Us may still have a online directory of suggested toys for differently abled kids-which points out what skills can be influenced by specific toys

Answer 6

The most important thing you can do is to encourage speech. with a child so young it should be done through play. verbally labeling objects is a good thing to do and try to get the child to repeat. You say it and then give him the opportunity to say it.