From the time your children are born, the best way to help them learn effective speaking skills is to talk with them all the time. Even when your children are babies, you can still interact with them through the use of smiles, noises, hand claps, and music.
Communicating with your children should be easy, but there are still some important things that you should keep in mind.
Here are some don’ts when interacting with your children.
Talking/Answering For Them
When you talk to your children, always remember to give them the opportunity to respond. Although your children won’t be responding with fluent sentences, they will be learning that people take turns talking. From a young age, children should be encouraged to respond to you even if it’s just with gurgles, smiles, and hand clapping when they’re babies.
Anticipating Their Needs
Along with talking/answering for your children, you can significantly discourage your kids’ need to speak by anticipating their needs. While you may have good intentions, a better approach to anticipating your children’s needs is to ask them to request the things that they would like. The ultimate goal is to encourage your children to feel comfortable voicing their needs by initiating conversation.
Not Responding
Just like it’s important for your children to learn taking turns in conversation by responding to your questions, it’s also important for you to respond to the gestures and speaking attempts of non-verbal children. When you do this effectively, you’ll create a safe environment for your children to talk more.
Ridiculing/Pretending
If your children have difficulty speaking, by all means, don’t ridicule their mistakes. Doing so will only make them self-conscious and less likely to communicate. Be compassionate, and with the help of gestures, you’ll gradually be able to understand what they are saying.
Being Impatient
Whenever your children begin to speak, you should give them as much time as they need to complete their thoughts. Before responding in a hurry, make sure that your children have enough time to process information, think, and respond. In addition to talking, you can also communicate with your children in other ways like using pictures, demonstrations, and other learned strategies.
Always remember the process of talking can be frustrating for the child, too.
Correcting Grammar
As your children begin to speak more, be particularly careful about correcting their grammar. Keep in mind that sentence structure isn’t important until your children have reached three word sentences.
Saying Too Much Too Quickly
Make sure that when you talk with your children, you aren’t saying too much too quickly. Speak slowly, keep directions/comments simple, and allow for processing time.
Dominating The Conversation
Whenever you communicate with your children, it’s a good idea to encourage them to sometimes lead the conversation. Try to be less directive and commanding.
Using Baby Talk
As your children grow, you may find yourself using less baby talk. For optimal communication, consider using language models appropriate to your children’s needs and age groups. Most importantly, make sure that you understand the differences between a simplified model and baby talk.
Requiring Polite Formalities
During the early developmental stages, communication is more important than polite formalities. At this point in learning how to talk, focus on ensuring that your children can speak in complete sentences before requiring them to add “yes ma’am,” “no ma’am” and “yes sir,” “no sir” in their interactions.
Asking Yes/No Questions
Since yes and no questions tend to end a conversation, these types of questions should be avoided. Why not ask open-ended questions instead like “What would you like to drink?” rather than “Would you like to drink some juice?”
Rote/Academic Language Learning
Many parents are unaware that academic learning and rote learning skills like the alphabet, numbers, and colors aren’t important for preschool children to communicate needs. Letters and numerals are symbols without purpose until attributed to spoken language or quantity. Children should have encounters that connect these symbols, letter names and sounds to each other before attempting memorization.
Schedule A Consultation Today!
Does your child have problems with speech or hearing? If so, Jacksonville Speech & Hearing Center is here to help! We proudly offer treatments, evaluations, and screenings for a variety of areas. Call us today at 904-355-3403 to schedule a consultation!
Hearing Loss: The Hidden Disability
/in Hearing & Audiology, News, Speech & Language /by Manny TorresHearing Loss: The Hidden Disability
Despite how damaged one’s auditory system may be, it’s difficult to recognize that a person is hard of hearing by simply looking at them. That’s why hearing loss is considered a common invisible disability, and often times, the condition is greatly misunderstood by others.
For example, if you’re hard of hearing and ask people to repeat themselves for the third or fourth time in a row, they’re more likely to be frustrated with you rather than empathetic. This reaction is likely because if people are unable to physically see your hearing loss, they’re less likely to conceptualize the difficulties you’re experiencing.
Read more
5th Annual Winter FUNraiser
/in Events, News /by Manny TorresJoin us for our 5th Annual Winter FUNraiser on Friday, February 1 at Culhane’s Irish Pub-Atlantic Beach from 5:00-7:30 PM! With a $10 donation, you receive 1 free drink ticket, a free hearing screening, and the chance to win a prize! Karaoke will also be featured. All proceeds benefit JSHC.
Stuttering: 6 Helpful Tips for Your Child
/in News, Speech & Language /by Manny TorresStuttering
Also known as a form of dysfluency, stuttering is an interruption in the flow of speech. When children stutter, they’re usually repeating certain phrases, sounds, syllables, and words. Although it’s normal for children between the ages of two and five to stutter, children who stutter past five years old may need special treatment for this language disorder.
The Causes of Stuttering
Many experts believe that there are four primary factors that cause this condition.
Read more
Thank You for Making #GivingTuesday 2018 a Success!
/in News /by JSHCThis year, JSHC raised a record-breaking $14,697 from a record 91 donors!
With these funds, our staff will be able to provide 294 speech evaluations and therapy sessions to low-income preschoolers, adding 42 new patients to our programming!
Such success can be attributed to the generosity of our many independent supporters, as well as the deep investment of JSHC staff and Board of Directors, 100 percent of whom participated in the giving campaign.
Thank you to all in our community who continue to support us not only on #GivingTuesday, but every day of the year. We’re proud to serve you and call you part of our family!
Support JSHC on #GivingTuesday December 3
/in Community Outreach, Events, News, Speech & Language /by Manny TorresChanging The World One Child At A Time!
#GivingTuesday #GivingtheGiftofCommunication
This year on Tuesday, December 3, the Jacksonville Speech & Hearing Center will participate in #GivingTuesday, a global day dedicated to giving.
#GivingTuesday harnesses the capability of social media along with the generosity of individuals around the world to generate true improvement in their communities; offering a stage so that they can encourage the donation of time, resources, and skills to heal local concerns. Additionally it brings together the shared power of an amazing assortment of partners— nonprofits , civic organizations, businesses, corporations, as well as families and individuals—to encourage and amplify small acts of kindness.
Fall Giving Celebration 2018
/in Events /by Manny TorresJoin us to celebrate the generous contributions of our FinFest Sponsors and Fund-A-Child donors!
The evening will feature a dedication ceremony honoring the leadership and contributions of Amy Ruth, and Myron and Amanda Pincomb.
Former Board Chair and longtime supporter Mike Heard will also be honored as our third-ever Director Emeritus.
Guests can RSVP to Sheri Taylor at staylor@shcjax.org or by calling (904) 717-6930.
FinFest 2019
/in Events /by Manny TorresMark your calendars for FinFest 2019!
We look forward to seeing you there!
Communication Don’ts
/in Speech & Language /by Manny TorresCommunication don’ts
From the time your children are born, the best way to help them learn effective speaking skills is to talk with them all the time. Even when your children are babies, you can still interact with them through the use of smiles, noises, hand claps, and music.
Communicating with your children should be easy, but there are still some important things that you should keep in mind.
Here are some don’ts when interacting with your children.
Talking/Answering For Them
When you talk to your children, always remember to give them the opportunity to respond. Although your children won’t be responding with fluent sentences, they will be learning that people take turns talking. From a young age, children should be encouraged to respond to you even if it’s just with gurgles, smiles, and hand clapping when they’re babies.
Anticipating Their Needs
Along with talking/answering for your children, you can significantly discourage your kids’ need to speak by anticipating their needs. While you may have good intentions, a better approach to anticipating your children’s needs is to ask them to request the things that they would like. The ultimate goal is to encourage your children to feel comfortable voicing their needs by initiating conversation.
Not Responding
Just like it’s important for your children to learn taking turns in conversation by responding to your questions, it’s also important for you to respond to the gestures and speaking attempts of non-verbal children. When you do this effectively, you’ll create a safe environment for your children to talk more.
Ridiculing/Pretending
If your children have difficulty speaking, by all means, don’t ridicule their mistakes. Doing so will only make them self-conscious and less likely to communicate. Be compassionate, and with the help of gestures, you’ll gradually be able to understand what they are saying.
Being Impatient
Whenever your children begin to speak, you should give them as much time as they need to complete their thoughts. Before responding in a hurry, make sure that your children have enough time to process information, think, and respond. In addition to talking, you can also communicate with your children in other ways like using pictures, demonstrations, and other learned strategies.
Always remember the process of talking can be frustrating for the child, too.
Correcting Grammar
As your children begin to speak more, be particularly careful about correcting their grammar. Keep in mind that sentence structure isn’t important until your children have reached three word sentences.
Saying Too Much Too Quickly
Make sure that when you talk with your children, you aren’t saying too much too quickly. Speak slowly, keep directions/comments simple, and allow for processing time.
Dominating The Conversation
Whenever you communicate with your children, it’s a good idea to encourage them to sometimes lead the conversation. Try to be less directive and commanding.
Using Baby Talk
As your children grow, you may find yourself using less baby talk. For optimal communication, consider using language models appropriate to your children’s needs and age groups. Most importantly, make sure that you understand the differences between a simplified model and baby talk.
Requiring Polite Formalities
During the early developmental stages, communication is more important than polite formalities. At this point in learning how to talk, focus on ensuring that your children can speak in complete sentences before requiring them to add “yes ma’am,” “no ma’am” and “yes sir,” “no sir” in their interactions.
Asking Yes/No Questions
Since yes and no questions tend to end a conversation, these types of questions should be avoided. Why not ask open-ended questions instead like “What would you like to drink?” rather than “Would you like to drink some juice?”
Rote/Academic Language Learning
Many parents are unaware that academic learning and rote learning skills like the alphabet, numbers, and colors aren’t important for preschool children to communicate needs. Letters and numerals are symbols without purpose until attributed to spoken language or quantity. Children should have encounters that connect these symbols, letter names and sounds to each other before attempting memorization.
Schedule A Consultation Today!
Does your child have problems with speech or hearing? If so, Jacksonville Speech & Hearing Center is here to help! We proudly offer treatments, evaluations, and screenings for a variety of areas. Call us today at 904-355-3403 to schedule a consultation!
Speech & Language Activities for Children
/in News, Speech & Language /by Manny TorresSpeech & Language Activities for Children
There are many easy activities that you can do with your children to encourage better speech and language skills. If you’d like to jumpstart language acquisition, consider making these speech and language activities with your children a part of your everyday lifestyle. Read more
Identifying Your Child’s Communication Milestones
/in Hearing & Audiology, News, Speech & Language /by Manny TorresIdentifying Your Child’s Communication Milestones
As a parent of a child between the ages of one month and five years old, you’re probably wondering how you can identify your child’s communication milestones. When it comes to healthy speech and hearing development, these are undoubtedly the most important years of your child’s life. Below you will find developmental milestones which represent, on average, the age by which most children will accomplish the listed skills.
Children typically don’t master all items in a category until they reach the upper age in each age range. Although this range is a great guide that you can use to monitor your little one’s progress, just remember that every child is unique and has an individual rate of development. Keep in mind that your children may not necessarily have a disorder if they haven’t accomplished one skill within an age range. Here’s a brief summary of the important communication milestones. Read more