Activities to stimulate language and speech during the holidays

I am so happy to see the Mot pour Mot community growing.

I am well aware that they wish to be better equipped for their work with monolingual and bilingual families. That being said, we are well aware that the continuity of services during the summer can vary considerably due to holidays and gaps between sessions.

Here are some suggestions to give to parents this summer to continue language stimulation, all in a fun way, and regardless of the language spoken.

Reminders for parents about language development:

• Your child learns through play
• Opportunities to provide language-rich models abound outside the system without having to plan anything or spend any money.

Suggestions for summer activities to stimulate language and speech:

• Blowing bubbles: to build vocabulary, work on joint attention, taking turns, and making "more" requests;
• Playing outdoors: to work on fine and gross motor skills, socialization, and language skills;
• Go on a treasure hunt by looking for things in nature: to build vocabulary, follow instructions, work on verbs and prepositions;
• Go swimming: to work on gross motor skills and vocabulary;
• Playing with a friend: to develop conversational skills, taking turns, socialization, and language as a whole;
• Drawing on the sidewalk with chalk: to work on colours, instructions, varied vocabulary, and fine motor skills;
• Having a picnic: to target vocabulary, sequences, conversation;
• Go for a walk: to describe what you see, work on vocabulary by making the other person guess what you see;
• Planting flowers: a pleasant sensory activity that also helps develop vocabulary;
• Playing in the park: to target vocabulary related to actions, games, and sounds in a repetitive way through play;
• Making lemonade: to understand the instructions, the sequences;
• Read books by participating in the TD Book Club : for the pleasure of reading!!!

This latest addition is my favorite choice as a clinician and mother.

It's not always easy to spark a desire to continue reading in the summer, especially when your child struggles with reading or understanding what's being read to them. Reading is one of my favorite activities, of course, for its many benefits, its infinite diversity, the richness it brings, the intimate moment associated with reading, and not forgetting the countless opportunities for language stimulation—oral, written, and a prerequisite for written language.

If this isn't already one of your suggestions to offer the families you work with, I highly recommend it!

Here's a sneak peek:

In addition, there are lots of competitions that children can participate in, with extra activities, and IT'S ALL FREE!

What child doesn't want to:

• Create a notebook
• Choosing books
• Vote for your favorite books
• Writing book reviews
• Answer quiz questions every week
• Writing stories
• Read and post jokes
• Read a comic book created especially for the club
• See workshops and reading sessions with the club's artists
• Print coloring pages
• Find the perfect book

The club is accessible to all ages, including pre-readers from 0 to 5 years old.

To register your child or help a parent register – they can either go to their local library or Sign up for the virtual notebook here.

PS For suggestions of DIVERSE and INCLUSIVE children's literature, I suggest you follow Dayani, also known as @mamandayani on Instagram, is here.

Between now and the start of the school year, you can expect another blog post in August, where I will offer tools and resources to help you with your return to routine, or how to help our families and their children prepare for the return to routine, so that everything goes smoothly.

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I wish you a wonderful summer vacation!