My child can't answer my questions.
‘WHAT, WHERE & WHO’ are typically considered to be early developing questions.
‘WHY, WHEN & HOW’ typically come later. I work on questions A LOT in therapy because being able to understand & answer questions will help you take part in everyday conversations with others.
Children who find it tricky to answer our questions may have an underlying language disorder. I like helping kids learn to answer “why” questions. Why?
Because being able to give a reason allows you the right to explain yourself, share your beliefs & even assert your own ideas. That’s significant! So here’s 2 tips for how I teach kids to answer those tricky ‘why’ questions.
❓ Give your child the answer first, for example, rather than saying, “Why do we need an umbrella today?” You could say, “It’s raining today. We need an umbrella...Why do we need an umbrella?” Because you’ve already given them the answer, you’ve done half the thinking for them. Now they just need help to structure the sentence. This helps teach children the concept of why questions.
❓Answer most of the response for them, leaving off the final word i.e., “Why do we need an umbrella? Because it’s ….” (Then look at them expectedly).
All children benefit from visuals & that’s the same when teaching questions! Checkout @smalltalk_speech as they some FREE question visuals via their bio that are great to use!
About the writer:
Lauren is a speech pathologist who has over 15 years experience working with children and teenagers who present with a range of learning and communication difficulties. Lauren is passionate about helping others and loves to find simple and creative ways to make learning fun!
The blog posts featured on this site are written on behalf of Remindables and are intended for educational purposes only and to provide general information and an understanding on a particular topic. By using this blog site, you must be aware that the information shown is not to be used as a substitute for therapy advice and you should therefore seek the opinion of suitable professionals to assist you. The views expressed here are the author’s views alone and not those of their employer or others, unless clearly stated. ⠀⠀⠀