You want to help your child’s language development. I get it! You want them to learn new words and you want them to be able to express themself better. Here’s one of the absolute biggest keys to supporting your child’s language development…

🛑 Stop asking your child so many questions!

💚 Make comments. Narrate. Notice. Share your thoughts and observations

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Here’s my challenge to you – subtly record a 3 minute interaction between you and your child.

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Count how many comments you make. Comments are statements like this:

“It’s a green one”

“I love Rice Bubbles too!”

“Oooo that looks squishy”

“I wonder where Maxie has gone”

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Count how many questions you ask. Questions can include:

“Which one do you want?”

“What’s this?”

“Where is your hat?”

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Ideally you want to have around 4 comments to every question. Use your hand as a visual reminder – thumb is for questions, fingers are for comments

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Why is this such an important strategy? Asking lots of questions can put a lot of pressure on a child. Even if they know the answer (and they don’t always) it builds a testing, pressured relationship dynamic. When you make more comments, you’re equalising the relationship and modelling lots of great language that your child can use one day too!

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If you want to learn more ideas for connecting with your autistic (or possibly autistic) child in a neurodiversity affirming way – I hope you’ll check out my online, on-demand course Connect & Grow.
This course is for curious parents of autistic (or possibly autistic) children aged around 1- 5 years old. Course access lasts for 12 months and you’ll get access to any updates and extra videos.