10 ways to effectively teach a 2-year-old child to speak and learn words

What to think about in advance

The full development of a child will not happen without mastering speech. The baby’s intelligence, memory, ability for self-development, tendency to self-learning, and conscious decision-making depend on this.

If a child is already two years old and he says almost nothing, this is an omission of the parents . It is a mistake to think that he will “talk.” Speech cannot be left to chance. A child will learn to speak if he is taught. His parents and relatives can do this even without the help of a specialist.

The process of learning to speak should begin before the baby is born. From the second third of the gestational period, the baby responds to sound. When they talk to a child, sing songs, read aloud, tell how glad they are for his appearance - this is the process of learning to speak.

We distinguish 4 stages of training:

Reasons for silence

It may seem strange to some, but a child’s reluctance to speak does not mean that he is developmentally delayed. For a baby to speak, he must need it for something.

There are many answers to the question why a child does not speak. Some children get everything they need without any effort. They have very caring parents. Mom knows how to guess her child’s desires even before he clearly manifests them. Then why should the baby make extra efforts?

Children are somewhat like animals. From experiments in teaching chimpanzees and gorillas the language of the deaf and mute, it is known that monkeys are able to use fairly long sentences in speech. Their problem is different: they open their mouths only when it benefits them. If the monkey is hungry, he will definitely go up to the person who is feeding him and say: “Give Washoe a banana. Washoe is very hungry." But if the animal does not see any benefit for itself in addressing a specific person, then it will not talk too much.

This is roughly the same problem for many children. They could talk, but they do not strive to do so. This is possible even at 6 years old, and not only at an early age.

In order for a child to speak, situations are needed in relationships with close adults when the child needs it. Without saying anything, he risks not getting something important for himself, for example, his mother's attention.

Some children are very shy. This is an individual feature that is not related to the level of speech development. Up to a certain age - 6 years and older - such a baby seems completely non-verbal, with undeveloped speech. However, at school he shows good abilities and fully developed speech. He was simply embarrassed to speak, and while it was possible, he avoided the need to do something that was psychologically difficult for him.

But it also happens that a child’s silence actually indicates a developmental delay. This can happen if there are some organic reasons for such a lag: underdevelopment of certain areas of the brain or something else. But this rarely happens. Much more often, the reason that a child at two years old does not speak is the behavior of adults towards this child.

If the baby was only looked after (fed, washed, put to bed), but hardly talked to him, then how can he suddenly speak? A talking child will not appear on its own. He must hear human speech addressed to him, hear it constantly, every day. Only then will he, sooner or later, speak on his own.

Recommendations from a speech therapist

Make it a rule to talk to your child everywhere

• Talk to your child a lot and everywhere - at home, on a walk, performing hygienic actions.
• Introduce your child to a variety of sounds.
• Allow your baby to play with small objects: beans, peas, beads, coins (under control, of course). They can be sorted, rearranged, poured using cups, jars, trays, spoons, scoops. Play with sand.
• Read fairy tales, short stories, poems, sing songs.
• Conduct re-enactments. For this, not only toys and homemade products will be useful, but also everyday items and products.
• Ask your child to talk more, carefully correcting his speech.
• Encourage him to name an object when the baby reaches out to it, demands it and, without trying to name it, hums. Offer him something nearby. If he refuses, explain that you did not understand him.
• Encourage your baby to communicate with other children - organize small holidays and group activities.

Speech of children and speech of adults

The fact that the baby does not speak properly may be due to a lack of understanding of the functions of speech in communication with young children.

When we are dealing with an adult, and when we are dealing with a child who is 2 years 3 months old, we use the same words of the same language, and it may seem to us that they are the same. Does it matter who you talk to?

In fact, speech for an adult is information. Not only, but mainly. When we adults talk to each other, we exchange information. We are not interested in completely uninformative speech. Speech that is extremely emotionally charged is perceived by us as almost indecent.

Children are different. For them, speech is the expression of their emotions, their manifestation, as well as the establishment of an emotional connection and contact with another person. For a child, it doesn’t matter what is said, but what matters is what emotions the speech is filled with, what matters is the personal relevance of the speech, and who exactly is speaking. He perceives the words of his mother and a stranger completely differently.

If, with the help of speech, the baby cannot unite himself with a loved one, an emotional connection does not arise if the adult’s speech addressed to the baby is always of a functional nature (the adult addresses the ward only when it is necessary for something for pragmatic reasons, gives some command), then the child loses interest in human speech. She doesn’t meet his needs, he doesn’t need her.

Therefore, the answer to the question of what to do to make a child speak at least at 2 years 9 months is: communicate with the child emotionally. That is, your appeals to him should express your true feelings: joy, tenderness, delight, pity, sadness. And with the help of speech, a connection should be established between you and the child.

Only in this case everything will be fine with his speech development, unless there are special reasons for his delay.

How to conduct speech development classes with your baby

These rules apply to virtually any child.

1. Get on the same level as the baby so that there is visual contact; in general, babies should be taken on your lap.
2. Classes should be conducted daily, no more than a quarter of an hour.
3. Preschoolers need play-based learning.
4. Massage your baby's face and do articulation exercises with him every day. Exercises on sound pronunciation and tongue twisters should be distributed over days.
5. With children under one and a half years old, speak loudly, opening your mouth wide in an exaggerated manner. With older guys - in a normal voice, clearly pronouncing sounds.
6. Don't forget the verbs. Also accumulate attributes of objects.
7. While reading books, discuss their characters.
8. From the age of two, children’s favorite game becomes “what is this?” It's especially fun to play outside.

The role of reading

Is it really that important to get your child to talk? Or is it enough, as many people think, to read good books to him?

If a child is 6 months old, he needs to smile, laugh and rejoice with him, that is, communicate with him. If he is 6 years old, then he can read, and perhaps he himself will become an active reader.

However, reading books in itself does not develop. It only develops a passion for reading.

If parents read the best books to their child for the second or third year, but there is no effect, this means that the adults themselves do not like to read. The task is not to read how many pages, but to infect the child with your passion, your emotions when reading. Then the child will understand how great it is to be able to read.

Learning to read is also not so important. Now everyone can read. But if the baby was read to from a very early age, but the child is 2 years 4 months old and doesn’t speak, then, apparently, they didn’t read it the way they should, they didn’t hook it, they didn’t captivate it. And this is precisely the task of adults.

If the child is 2-3 years old and does not speak, you need to determine the cause of the problem. Then it will become clear what needs to be done. Don't worry: he will talk when he can and when he wants.

Tags:Conversation

We also recommend reading on this topic:

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• There is a hyperactive child in the family at 2 years old
• What causes aggressive behavior in preschool children
• Features of raising a 5 year old girl

Development of fine motor skills

Pavlov also noted the use of muscle sensations leading from the speech organ to the cerebral cortex. This also happens in a child who begins to speak, imitating the mother’s facial expressions. After seven months of age, this ability in babies begins to weaken. That is why in the future it is necessary to use other methods. Experts have noted that the development of finger movements coincides with speech development. That is why their motor skills need to be developed in order to quickly master their native language.

Work on training children's fingers should begin as early as seven months. To do this, the baby should be allowed to roll plasticine balls or use large wooden beads as a toy. At one and a half years the tasks should be more complicated. The baby needs to be occupied with buttoning buttons or tying knots.

What can we do as parents?

Talk to your child as much as possible

- This is one of the most obvious results of numerous studies on child development.

The connection between words and the mind was discovered as a result of one rather extravagant study. During the experiment, specialists entered the homes of families every month for three years and recorded every aspect of verbal communications between parents and their children. They measured vocabulary size, diversity, growth, frequency of speech interactions, and emotional content of speech. From this study, which involved more than 40 families, two important conclusions were drawn:

• The number and variety of words matter.

  The gold standard is 2100 words per hour.
  The variety of words spoken is almost as important as the number of words spoken. You can reinforce language skills with the following iterations: look at the baby, imitate his laughter, sounds and facial expressions, encourage his attempts to speak with your increased attention. Children whose parents spoke to them in a positive manner, in rich language and regularly, knew twice as many words as children who were spoken to only when necessary!

• Conversation increases IQ.
  Talking to children early in their lives also improves their IQ, research shows, even after factoring in family wealth. By the age of three, the IQ is 1.5 times higher in children with whom their parents actively communicated.

Peculiarities

You should not compare your baby with his peers. Each person is unique, with his own specific pace and development goals. Sometimes the reason for silence lies precisely in the parents. Overly caring. This is when they understand at a glance what the child wants and satisfy his need.

He simply does not need to strain, all the work is done for him. Or, on the contrary, he may protest when adults are too active in their desire to teach him to speak.

Therefore, be careful and take into account the characteristics of both the child and the conditions in which he grows and develops.

If in other respects he is not inferior to his peers, put your worries aside; the moment will come when you will dream that he would be silent at least a little.

This means that if he understands when someone turns to him, fulfills requests, and is able to dress, undress, and eat at least occasionally without the help of adults, then there is no reason to worry.

For example, everything is fine if you tell him to bring the ball - he goes not to the kitchen, but to where his toys are. Or ask for a bottle - that’s what he gives, not a stone or any other object. He also does not ignore the request, pretending that no one addressed him.

There is a hypothesis among scientists that modern children are not at all what we and our parents were. They understand that they are not at all “at par” with adults and decide to remain silent, forming, so to speak, a passive vocabulary. And at some point they simply begin to communicate in phrases, and complex ones at that.

Gender differences are also taken into account. Girls usually develop faster than boys. So, your silent person will not speak directly on command, but you are quite capable of arousing interest in dialogue.

How to teach a child to speak

1. Experts recommend teaching your baby words while he is in the womb. As you know, a baby, at a certain period of its intrauterine development, hears sounds made by adults. Relatives are advised to have conversations with the child as often as possible, sing to him, tell him fairy tales and poems, so he will gradually learn to speak.
2. First of all, it is recommended to completely abandon the pacifier. The fact is that the process of sucking a pacifier inhibits articulation.
3. Parents need to constantly repeat the names of objects that come across the baby’s path.
4. Fine motor skills play a role in the proper development of the speech apparatus. In order for fine motor skills to be constantly developed, you need to allow your child to feel objects, for example, a spoon, cubes, puzzles, buttons. Moreover, it is necessary to show the child how water flows, give him the opportunity to sculpt from dough and paint with paints.
5. In order for the child to pronounce words correctly faster, parents should read fairy tales, poems, and pronounce tongue twisters to the child.
6. When a child reaches the age of one, he must be taught the simplest words to express his desires.
7. Parents, in a playful way, should pronounce the sounds of different animals. It will be very useful to show animals and reproduce their sounds during a walk.
8. On the part of parents, the most correct thing would be not to accustom the child to the use of electronic gadgets, but, on the contrary, to provide him with balls, pyramids, cubes, and buckets.