First Sounds....

Encouraging a good and clear sound for your child is important for communication skills; speaking, reading, and writing.

“We go to da pwaygwound” is only “cute” to you. To everyone else it sounds like the child needs speech therapy.




I babysat for a couple of little girls, and it took me weeks to decipher what they were saying. They spoke a lot, just not very clearly. Imagine what the impact is on a child when they begin to read and spell, and they see the word playground, not pwaygwound.




“Him has t’ go aside”--written, you can probably get the idea that a male (him)
needs to go outside. My little charge was trying to tell me that the puppy needed to go out to piddle, but she was running her words together and it wasn’t clear to me for a while what she meant. “Is for weez” was really “It’s for us”. Again, this may seem very cute and appropriate for a young age, BUT when she gets into class and has to form her sentences and write them, she will have to unlearn much of what has been re-enforced in her formative years. These little girls were clearly old enough to have their language corrected, but the parents thought it was cute.




Practice consonant and vowel sounds with them, long before you introduce the written concept. Making sure they can clearly hear and repeat a true sound, will help them when they need to write and read. Letting them continue to speak “baby-babble” is a true unkindness.




When introducing the written letters, it’s a good idea to have large flash cards and have the child trace the letters as you say them. First while looking at the letter, and then with their eyes closed. (You hold their hand and help them trace the letters in the same way that they would write them, for “t” the straight line down then add the cross bar) If you notice they continue to have confusion about certain letters, you can try a variety of methods to help. Scent. Are they confusing “b” and “d”? Try green apple for one, and peppermint for the other--making sure that you are saying the letter and the sound very clearly for each one. (Don’t forget to write down what scent you have used for which letters!) If that doesn’t work, try “writing” the letters on their back with your finger, again while saying the letters. Or tactile methods--make a fuzzy “b” and a sandpaper “d”, and have them trace it with their fingers. One of those three methods usually works, but there are others to try.




Hold up an apple and slowly say aaaaapppple, stressing the short "a" sound. When they repeat it, listen carefully that the “ple” doesn’t become “apuw”. If they are hearing something other than the “l”--quickly let them hear that sound separately…and then at the beginning of a word “love the baby”, “love”, apple. It can take time for a child to be able to distinguish sounds, or even for their little mouths to be able to make the sound correctly, so patience and perseverance is key.



Remember this is correction, not discipline…so the corrections should never have a negative connotation or impatient sounding voice.




How you hear a word in your head is how you will try to spell a word, and if you are saying a word incorrectly, you can’t even look it up in the dictionary.





Recommended Reading:
The Cheery Scarecrow
author/illustrator: Johnny Greulle
This is an adorable story with brilliant illustrations by the author of the famed Raggedy Ann and Andy books, though those two are not in this book.
Two children meet with talking scarecrow and have some refreshments with him...
this is a very old story and seems to be available in limited areas...some libraries list it though. Antiquarian shops or eBay often have a copy or two. Worth the effort to find this one.