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Expert Q&A
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| By Harriet S. Worobey, M.A. Early Childhood Educator Director, the Nutritional Sciences Preschool | ||
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A child in my preschool class will not talk. Any advice?
As frustrating as it can be, I do think that the child's mother is correct when she says that her child will talk to adults when she is ready. You certainly cannot MAKE the child speak to you. However, I would think that there might be some non-confrontational techniques that you could try that might have some success. My first thought is puppets. Perhaps starting with one-on-one play with the child, with you (or another adult teacher) taking two puppets and acting both roles Nothing special -- just a person puppet pretending to feed an animal puppet, or something. Maybe the person could feed the animal the wrong kind of food (hopefully making the child laugh) and then the person could ask the child to help her find something that the animal could eat. The child would feel no pressure to speak but could use her receptive language to participate in the game. On the next occasion you could encourage the child to use one of the puppets herself, even if she silently brings you play food. Further down the road, she might be willing to tell you the names of some of the foods. What I always find useful is to purposefully pick wrong or silly answers and let the child correct me. The same type of techniques could work with baby dolls, stuffed animals, dollhouse dolls, or Legos with people and animals. Even reading her a story and inserting a wrong word (calling the cow a pig) might encourage her to speak to you.
Since she has this problem at home with relatives and neighbors, I would try not to take this too personally. I know that as preschool teachers we want the best for our children and expect to see progress over the year, but on the positive side, she seems comfortable, happy, and sociable with the other children in a setting away from her own home. Those are things that wouldn't have been possible without school. Also, she will be back with you next year as a 4-year-old, and many changes could occur next year. Good luck!
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