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Lesson 1: "Getting Dressed" - DISCUSSION

What did you notice in the video clip you've just seen? The parent in the video used some wonderful methods, communication-wise, but there were also some things she might have done a bit better.

On the positive side, she was talking the whole time she was in her daughter's presence. This is such a wonderful thing to do! (It's called "Self-Talk", and we'll be looking at that more closely in the next lesson.)

However, there were two important strategies that this mom did NOT use. The first was that she did not take into account Physical Cues. When talking with your child, it is very important to:
  • make sure to establish eye contact with the child before you begin to converse. (Our mom was talking with her back to the child! Ack! Try to avoid doing that!)
  • use pointing, gestures and physical objects to support your meaning. (The mom was just talking randomly and not pointing out, say, the red shirt or the blue shorts as she was talking about them. Tying the spoken words more specifically to an object can be a fabulous way to help your child begin to associate the names of things with the objects or ideas to which they refer!)

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The second strategy our mom did NOT use in this scene was an appropriate Length of Utterance. This may sound like a complicated "educational" term, but really all it means is that you:

  • use phrases that are right about the same length as the ones your child is now using on her own - or just a little bit longer! (For example, this child is 3 years old and using gestures and some one- and two-word phrases to communicate. So... the best way to talk with her right now is in small "chunks" of information that she can understand more easily. Using one or two-word phrases is the most appropriate way to be meaningful to this little one right now! Just talking away in full sentences, as the mom in our video did, provides the child with "linguistic overload" - too much information for her to process right now)

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Now that you are more aware of the importance of Physical Cues and Length of Utterance, try watching another version of "Getting Dressed"!

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