By Brooke Stoyak M.A., CCC-SLP
Struggling to target your child’s articulation sounds at home for homework? Wanting to see more progress with your child’s articulation development? This is a read for you! See below for tips/tricks on targeting articulation at home:
- Be consistent: Add your child’s articulation practice into their already established routine. Practice their speech sounds during teeth brushing time, in the car on the way to school/events or when getting ready to go to bed! Make the new articulation routine consistent for your child.
- Short and sweet: Don’t spend long lengths of time targeting your child’s speech sounds. Take 5-10 minutes to target their speech sounds during their newly established articulation routine.
- Make it enjoyable: Articulation practice can be fun and exciting. Play new games, give lots of praise and give your child “special” 1:1 time with mom, dad, grandma, etc.
- Follow the steps: Make sure you’re following the right steps to target articulation, as advised by your speech-language pathologist. Targeting speech sounds in the appropriate order is necessary for proper articulation development!
Ideas to target articulation at home:
- Target your child’s articulation sounds when reading books
- Target your child’s articulation when playing any game with game vocabulary (e.g., go, stop, my turn, eat, more, please, etc.)
- Play “I Spy” at home and target desired speech sounds in natural conversation
- Make a scavenger hunt with familiar items in your home with your child’s targeted speech sounds (e.g. shovel, shoe, shirt, etc.)
- Create a “mystery box” (e.g., tissue box, shoe box, etc.) with items inside with your child’s targeted sounds. Practice with the phrase: “I found a…”
- Take turns being “teacher” and have your child teach you how to produce their targeted speech sound
- Use play dough to make a word with your child’s targeted speech sound or use the play dough to have your child make a “mouth” to show you the proper articulation placement for their targeted sound