This week’s theme is interactivity
Children learn in a different way when they are socially engaged – hearing many words isn’t enough, little ones need to be part of the conversation. You don’t have to wait until your little one is talking to engage them in a back-and-forth interaction. This week we will share information about different ways your little one learns from interactivity, and how you can boost interactivity in your interactions.
Read more about interactivity basics
Topic of the Day: Turn Taking 🔁
When babies are very young, it takes some time to learn about the sounds of their languages, and how to control the muscles they need for speech. If little ones have plenty of opportunities, they quickly figure out that signals like eye-gaze, gestures, and accidental vocalizations catch the attention of others. When people respond to their gaze, and vocal sounds, most little ones are delighted, and soon learn to initiate engaging behaviours more often. You can help your little one on the path to strong language skills by looking out for opportunities for a back-and-forth interaction, and keeping interactions going by taking turns for as long as possible.
A turn taking interaction might be as simple as this:
- 👶🏽 [staring]
- 🧒🏾 Hello there!
- 👶🏽 bmph…
- 🧒🏾 Oh Really?
- 👶🏽 ahh
- 🧒🏾 Yes, I think so too!
How does it work? Your interactions together will help your little ones learn that their actions have outcomes in the social world, building pathways for stronger social communication including speech. Back-and-forth interactions also help children learn the timing of turn taking, and help them practice the back-and-forth rhythm of how to take turns together. No matter whether turns are created from real words, sounds, or gestures, little ones can start to learn the sing-song melody of a conversational turn – the prosody of speech. You can help support your little one by waiting a little longer than usual for them to take their turn, and accepting a wider variety of responses, as legitimate turns.
Key point. When they are very young, little ones don’t really know how to keep their interactions going longer. They might try lots of different things like smiling, laughing, or waving their hands. You can help support their emerging interaction skills by looking for chances to interact or chances to keep a back-and-forth interaction going.
- look for opportunities to start a back-and-forth interaction
- wait for a response
- respond to their signals – even if they don’t make sense!
How do I recognize a turn? What does a turn look like? For young infants, their turn might not include speech yet, so watch out for a smile, a giggle, or a twitch. For toddlers, look out for quiet sounds, head-nodding, and lower energy responses. Any of these can be a marker for you to keep the conversation going. On your side, you might pull a silly face, gasp, or laugh. You might even ‘boop’ their nose, and wait for them to respond before doing it again! All of these activities help little ones build up the skills your little one needs to understand what turn taking means in an interaction. Most importantly – interactions are FUN! Try to challenge yourself to see how you can keep them going for longer!
Watch: Video of Dad talking sports with babbling son
Read more about Turn Taking
http://www.hanen.org/Helpful-Info/Articles/Timing-is-everything,-when-it-comes-to-taking-turn.aspx
Read the science:
Ramírez, Naja Ferjan, Sarah Roseberry Lytle, and Patricia K. Kuhl. “Parent coaching increases conversational turns and advances infant language development.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117.7 (2020): 3484-3491. https://www.pnas.org/content/117/7/3484.short