The beginning developmental years of your child go by so fast. Before you know it, they’re making eye contact with you and talking to you! While you are soaking in these special days with your child, there are skills you can model to aid in their speech and language development, all during play!

Within the first two years, your child should be attempting/developing sounds like: H, P, N, D, M, B, and W. Also, they should be making requests, shaking their heads yes and no, and identifying body parts! As a parent, what are activities we can do in order to help provide a fun environment for our child to learn?

Bubbles: this is a fun way to introduce new words like: more, again, please, go

Books: interactive books are a great tool to engage your child! Instead of asking, “What is this?”, feel free to name the object and describe it!

Farm animals and/or cars: you can model different environmental sounds (animal noises, car noises) in order to expand your child’s ability to imitate

Songs: sing with your child! Children can learn a lot through singing familiar nursery rhymes (Old McDonald, Wheels on the Bus)

The most important thing to remember is to have fun! Your child is not expecting you to be perfect. These beginning years are so crucial to your child’s development, so understanding how to play and teach your child is a great skill to practice.