A. Read picture book stories to your child and ask questions about the story or the pictures. If you read a sentence such as "The little boy peeked in the oven and found a big chocolate cake!", ask your child to show you the oven, cake or boy in the picture. Play a silly game saying "Did he find a cape?", "Did he find a rake?", and so on until your child can say "No" and tell you the correct answer.
B. Similar "silly game" activities can be played while looking at magazines. Tell your child that he/she must try to catch you saying the words wrong. Then, you point to a picture and say a word that sounds almost like the correct one. For example point to "chair" and say "bear", point to "dish" and say "fish" or point to "pot" and say "pop". Sometimes you must really say the word correctly to see if your child is really listening. If he/she catches you making a mistake, say "What is it?", pointing to the picture, and see if he/she can say the word.
C. When your child can easily do these picture-type activities, try asking him/her to go get something from another room. Choose two words that sound alike and are available in your home, such as "glue" and "shoe", "sock" and "block", etc. Make sure the objects are where they can be seen and where the child can get them when you are playing this game.
© Parent-Child Services Group, Inc. 5/97
Lynne F. Harmon, M.A., CCC-SLP
Permission to copy for educational purposes only