Another activity that we do daily that can be a language rich experience is eating at the breakfast/dinner table! Everyone is together, and eating is such a social experience! For the most part, eating at the table is enjoyable and relaxing! There are kiddos that have a hard time with eating but showing them that being at the table can be a fun thing is a big step! Here are a few ideas of ways to incorporate speech and language into mealtimes!
-Talk about what you are eating! Talk about the names of the foods. You can play “I Spy” with items on the table and on your plate. You can describe the foods you are eating by telling what category they are in (fruits, vegetable), talk about the color, the temperature, the texture, etc. The more adjectives you can use to describe a food, the more vocabulary it builds!
-Work on pronouns by talking about who is at the table, what each person is eating, what is each person’s favorite foods at the meal, etc. You can use words like “his”, “her”, “she”, “he”, “we”, “they”. These are all important pronouns that children need to learn.
-You can work on location words by talking about where foods are in relation to different items on the table. Examples: “Your cup is above your plate”, “the salad is in the middle of the table”, “your fork is next to your plate”.
-You can work on directions while eating, too! They can work on giving directions and you follow them, and you can give them directions and they can follow them!
-You can work on requesting different foods and wanting “more”. They can use specific language to request what they want, or if they are not yet using words, you can get them to ask “more” of something they like. They can point to what they want as well!
These are just a few ideas during dinner that you may be doing already but that you can expand on as well! Mealtimes are a great time to work on language with the whole family present! This can help with generalizing skills they are learning with other people as well! As always, if you have questions or concerns regarding your child, feel free to reach out and ask!
-Amber