Playful language support for children
Babies and toddlers are already born with all the abilities for interaction with their environment. This includes the Vocalizations, facial expressions, gestures and body language. This means they can already communicate with other people from the beginning of their lives. This is also important, because the communication of immediate needs ensures survival. Whether it is individual sounds that express the desire for contact or the baby has to cry and scream to express its discomfort: Parents usually intuitively know what their baby wants to communicate and can understand the sounds and facial expressions of the little ones like spoken language.
Gradually toddlers learn to speak, and the language development of a child is a very long process. Although the language center in the brain is already present at birth and the organs and muscles needed for speaking are developed, each child learns its language skills at its own pace. Therefore the age at which a child begins to speak also varies greatly. In the same way all children differ in how quickly they can expand their vocabulary and form sentences.
When do children start to speak?
Some children say their first word as early as nine months, others exactly on their first birthday, and others take until their second year. In the course of the third year of life the number of words children actively adopt into their speech grows explosively. Experts currently think that children learn their first 50 words only very slowly. Later they can learn up to 10 new words a day. This phase lasts roughly from 18 months to six years of age
Supporting language development is fun
Generally, children love to talk and are very creative with sounds, words, sentences and their voice. Everyday situations can easily be used to support children in the lovely process of language development. Many words, and also grammar and pronunciation are extended and reinforced through active practice: when doing a puzzle or board game, reading or being read to, looking at picture books, experimenting or singing. The possibilities are many
Playful support for communicative development
Promoting communicative development with dolls
Role-play is a wonderful way to get children talking. Particularly when playing with dolls children process things they have experienced in their everyday life and often take on the role of a parent. They often imitate conversations or sometimes fall silent. Even then, though, they are telling a story in their heads and thus expand their language skills.
Promoting communicative development through children's games
Children's language development can also be fostered through playing together. The HABA classic Obstgarten not only broadens vocabulary, language comprehension and sentence forms, it has brought children and their families lots of fun for many generations.
Promoting communicative development with children's books
Stories prompt children to speak. That's why reading aloud is so important for language development and also helps strengthen children's personalities and social skills. Regular reading aloud at a set time thus becomes an intense snuggle and feel-good time.
Babies can already play with buggy books, and from the age of one children are old enough for their first board picture books with simple illustrations and short rhymes. Later they enjoy short stories and their first non-fiction books about everyday life, their favourite animals, vehicles or toys.
