Communication
Communication through words, and reading facial expressions and body language, is how people interact. Society's goal for every child is to be able to express himself. The child with a special need will often have to learn specific skills in a sequence to accomplish this.
Expressing Wants and Needs
It is important for your child to develop communication skills to ask for things. You may feel that you know your child's thoughts and can save him frustration by giving him what he wants before it becomes a situation out of control, but this will not help your child in the long-run.
Work with your child on socially acceptable ways to ask for the things he wants and needs:
In the beginning, have the child point to an item or a picture instead of just taking it or going into meltdown.
Focus on a specific area (perhaps asking for a drink of water).
Show your child how to sign or say “water please.”
Have another family member model the request and then reward that person with the requested water.
When your child attempts to ask for water, repeat the request, and then reward him with the drink.
Always reward attempts to request something.
Make a list of things you want your child to be able to request: food, toys, activities, choice in clothing, TV programs, DVDs, and music CDs. Work with him on the things that are most important to him first; he will be motivated to ask for them. Chances are that these are the requests that will come up most often. Gradually add other things to your list.
Questions
How frustrating it must be to not be able to ask questions! You ask questions to get information about things you don't understand. You ask questions to understand what is coming next. You ask questions just out of curiosity.
Practice questions and answers with your child. Use the pattern that you used to help him ask for things. Focus on a few types of questions and then expand to others.
Even though why seems to be the question that preschoolers adore, it is the last question to practice. It is by far the most difficult to understand. Start with who and what. When your child is having some success, go on to where and when.
Fact
Don't introduce new words and phrases too quickly. All children learn language spontaneously in steps. Learning language is a baby-step process for children with special needs. A typically developing baby sitting in the highchair hears mom talking about food. She picks up on the words and sentences. A baby with special needs will require more focused, direct practice.
Expressing Feelings
Use pictures and books to work with your child on expressing feelings. Talk about how the person feels. Keep your wording simple: “The girl is sad. The girl dropped her ice cream.” Focus on basic feelings (happy, sad, mad, tired) and then include other feelings one at a time.
Basic Conversations
Basic conversations are hard for many kids with special needs. Understanding how to use questions, practicing the give and take of basic conversation skills, staying on the topic of the conversation, and making eye contact can be difficult. These are skills that are often practiced with the speech and language therapist, but follow-up at home is also important.
