another receptive language programme on the radio with the annoying bits taken out.

[lingle]

to save you all the pain of listening, I'll just do the tips.

1. kids with receptive delays tend to learn nouns first.

1. the next thing to teach is the basic prepositions because they can be demonstrated very very physically and give the child an early opportunity to give commands ("shoes off!"). A jack-in-the-box is good for "in" and "out"

1. if they mix up "up" and "down", consider not teaching opposite concepts at the same time. Be happy with "down" meaning both up and down for a while.

1. Avoid using pictures at this stage especially for active "doing" children. Kids are likely to miss your point if you use pictures.

1. It's very easy to teach mistakes. If you say "choo choo" every time the train goes, he may start to think that "choo choo" means "go". BUT that is actually good news because it means he is processing the concept "to go" and that is therefore the next thing you should teach. So sometimes their mistakes made imitating you give good clues as to what they are ready for [this was interesting for me because DS2 uses "all aboard" as a verb].

6 teachmetotalk.com under "sign language" has a list called "first 100 words" with suggested first verbs.

1. verbs. start with eat. verbs starting with a vowel are sometimes easier to say. a child who found it easy to say "uh oh!" when he couldn't say anything else is likely to benefit from using lots of vowels.

1. avoid flashcards with verbs. do the action.

1. wash is a good early verb. also kiss, open, close, (use either close or shut -never combine them), push [always say it as if you are pushing something really heavy that is making you puffed out], pull,[ditto - convey the physical effort] fix (the sign for fix is too hard for this age), broke(n). It is good to accompany these with signs which can be home made. Also play, cuddle, hurt (a bit later), "gimme" "want", "allgone", "dance", "help", [always say it as if you are in trouble], "fall", "shake", "see", "look" (a good power word for the child) "sit down" "stand up" "catch", "blow" (pretend food is hot)"cry", "swing", "slide", "climb" "ride", "rock", "come", "draw/write/colour" (choose one - write is the easiest to say)

10. do not object to your child learning "I want" for fear of rudeness. do not try to teach "please can I have" instead

11. In conclusion, exaggerate your actions as you demonstrate the verbs - you should be very goofy - and keep your utterances short and sweet. "Dog up!" is better than "put the doggy up the slide, he wants to go up the slide" for, say a 2 1/2 year old with receptive language delay.

12. don't believe you have to use the adult models. they haven't worked yet have they?

Crikey this is long, will post this in case I delete.

13. also "fly".

14. be goofy, repetitive, funny, whatever it takes to make their eyes light up. Try to be like an embodiment of their favourite cartoon. Many speech therapists are trained to work with older children on articulation issues and can fail just for this reason even though the content of what they say is fine.

15.If you find the goofy stuff hard, buy her DVDs as seeing it will make it easier to fake it.

Phew. next is adjectives and pronouns. Ooh! pronouns!

thank you for your public service to mumsnetkind

I also tried to teach "I want to have" instead of "I want", big mistake.

all in the past for you total. Anyway, couldn't resist the pronouns. If the problem is language processing, pronouns may resist therapy for longer than other word types. A language -delayed child will get these at 3 or 4.

"me""my" and "mine" are the easiest if a child is possessive.

Point to your chest when you say "me".
Pretend to grab things back saying "mine!" "no - mine!" is a common first sequence. Me my and mine are fairly easy to say as "M" is an easy consonant.

"I" and "you" are much harder. Start with snacks and another sibling/adult. Get the other people to answer "who wants a biscuit?" by saying "I do!""I want it?". [this worked with DS2]

consider pointing to your own eye for "I" (this is a little controversial but may help a child who needs things to be less abstract and more concrete).

To teach you, try using "You do it!" to get them to do things. Make sure you point at them as you say "you" and make it exaggerated so they laugh ("You!" tidy up!")

Consider saying "you, DS2, blow the bubble"."I, mummy, blow the bubble". Or try "You do it! You do it! bob do it! You! Bob!" (when speaking to bob).

If a child is echolalic, don't attempt "you" until they have mastered "I".

Model it the way you would hope they would say it.

It really helps to have a third person there. Preferably a big sister or brother that they want to imitate.

Gender pronouns come in much later. Talk about boys and girls for a long time. Then introduce it by saying "It's the boy's turn. He wants to do it. It's the girl's turn. She wants to do it". Use a catalogue with pictures of boys and girls on the same page.
Remember they have to have the prerequisite concept of understanding gender before they can possibly do the pronouns. So teach it well after the categories of "girls" and "boys".

If a child is echolalic, don't attempt "you" until they have mastered "I".
Erm, too late... [argh emotion at DS having many of his verbs in second person singular]
I hereby propose a virtual equestrian statue to lingle

yes, did that too sc13. He used "do you want?" to mean "I want" for about 6 months.

OK next radio programme coming up. dated last night. Again, don't listen unless you're feeling strong as there is lots of
sales material stuff about how you need "early intervention" programmes from 15 months.

Again, I'm leaving out the milestones but this is the next level up again.

1. Parts of an object: check if your child has a problem with these. eg on a dog can they point to the tail, on a house can they point to the roof. do they have a problem "seeing" parts? If so, just repeat, repeat, repeat.[funny one this as those of you whose kids I know a bit about would not report problems here I suspect]

1. Object Functions - identifying something by what it is used for

model, model, model, model, model. Whenever you give a child a hairbrush, say "this is for brushing!". Say, "look, teddy wants a drink! do we need a cup or a shoe?". This frequently prompts deliberate use of the wrong response to see your exagerrated reaction. Go with this. "NO!!!! not a shoe!!!! that's yucky!!!! Many children can name an object but not identify it by its function. They may grasp ffunction quite well but not be able to do it with language. eg child sees toy hat and puts it on teddy. But cannot respond to "what are hats for?". When you think your child has got this, select 6 pictures of the following items: a shoe, a glass, a bike, a tv, a pan, a pair of scissors. Ask "which one goes on your feet?" "which one do you ride?" "which one is for watching [your cartoon] on?"

1. Categories

eg food, toys, people, children, ladies, men, etc. many autistic children have no problem with tis, especially ones who tend to hoard and treasure particular objects. If you think your child "has" this, check by setting out 9 different pictures containing three category items, eg 3 items of clothing, 3 animals and 3 items of food. Then say "show me the food", "show me the animals".

1. Quantities

First quantities to teach are

• all
• some
• some more
• few

-many Practice with "let's clean up all the blocks. Let's turn over some of the pieces. let's turn over some more of the pieces; let's turn over all the pieces. Teach 1 and 2 but don't bother with any other numbers.

1. Negation. They may not always understand this even if using negative words.

To check this, you need 5 pictures, one of which is the odd one out. You can ask: "which one is not red?" "which one is not a lady?". etc. Remember to shake your head vigourously whenever using "not".

1. Inferences: [getting quite advanced here]ie deducing something that is not obvious. Requires a big vocabulary. Practice as follows. When you give an object eg a coat, explain the purpose in simple language. "It's cold outside. You need a coat. Coats keep us warm". Don't be too wordy. Practice with a toy animal. "Teddy, are you sleep?""yes""what do you want to do?" "I want to go to bed".

To test: get a picture of a sunny day and a picture of a rainy day. And a picture of a boy with wet shoes. "Charlie's shoes got wet today. Do you think it was a sunny day or a rainy day?".

Phew, all done, but at least I know I won't lose these notes.

Forgot to say work on 1,2 and 3 first. Then 4 and 5. Then 6. (but lay the groundwork for higher levels as soon as you can do so using language the child understands)

I must be tired but this reminds me so much of the English as a foreign language exam I had to take back in the day. It was all hazy black-and-white photos and you were asked "What do you think happened to the woman in this photo?". We'd all make up crazy stories because, to be honest, you couldn't tell. A friend of mine just said "can't see anything" - would she have been the EFL equivalent of ASD, I wonder?

lol and bump for starlight.

bumping as we've been discussing this on a 2019 thread.