Helping children...
Understand and be understood
 
Illustration by Andrea Elovson, from The Kindergarten Survival Handbook To be ready for school, and learn what they'll be taught, children need to be able to understand what other people say to them. They also need to speak clearly so that other people can understand them, too.

Listen to your child as if you never met him or her before. Closing your eyes helps.

Be honest: are there ways he or she says things, or uses special words that only you and the rest of your family understand?

 Illustration by Andrea Elovson, from The Kindergarten Survival Handbook
 
LET CHILDREN TALK AND LISTEN
TO OTHER PEOPLE ON THE PHONE SOMETIMES.
Illustration by Andrea Elovson, from The Kindergarten Survival Handbook
Listening to other people on TV and the radio
gives them a chance to hear the way other people speak.

Ask them to repeat what someone said
or tell you what the program was about.

That way they have to listen,
they have to try to remember what they heard,
and they practice talking about it.
 
Illustration by Andrea Elovson, from The Kindergarten Survival Handbook THERE ARE MANY WAYS
        PARENTS CAN HELP CHILDREN
                SPEAK CLEARLY.

Give your child short messages to deliver for you...

"Daddy wants to know
where his keys are."

                Ask your child to tell you
                what the person who got
                the message said.

                                    "Mommy says they're
                                    where you left them."

 Illustration by Andrea Elovson, from The Kindergarten Survival Handbook
 
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Copyright © Parent Education Resources from The Kindergarten Survival Handbook
Part 2, "A Guide for Parents"