I’m over at the Friendship Circle Blog today sharing my 10 tips for selecting toys for your speech delayed chid. I get asked ALL THE TIME about what toys are the best for speech and language development. In one word: SIMPLE! Â Here is a little sneak peak of what I am sharing over there….
1. Ditch the Batteries
My first recommendation, is to skip the batteries. If the toy requires batteries, you probably don’t want it. OR…if it takes batteries, you can take them out. One good example is a the really cute farm set from a very popular toy maker. The toy set itself is great! But the barn has batteries so that it can make noises. You don’t need the barn to make noises. You want your CHILD to make the noises! So…do like I do and just take them out.
There are a few exceptions to this, of course. My kids have a couple toys that use batteries that I have allowed them to keep (with batteries in). They have a couple toy cameras that take real pictures, a toy lap top (I could take the batteries out, but I’ve left them in), a toy vacuum (again, I could remove the batteries here too), a microphone that you can record your voice (so cool), and a “karaoke” type toy. Their toy drill also requires batteries and it is such a cool toy-it actually works! So again…there definitely are exceptions but I would try to have most of your toys battery free.
2. Pick Open Ended Toys
What are open ended toys? They are toys that have no beginning, middle or end. They can be used in a variety of ways and allow your child creative freedom in how to manipulate and use them. These toys tend to be the more basic and traditional toys. Which is NEXT on my list!
Want to read the rest? Head over to the Friendship Circle Blog now and check out the rest of my post! And please, let me know what you think!
Your idea of open-ended toys is really great. It not only helps your child’s creativity, but it also allows them then enhance their motor skills. Thank you for sharing your advice.
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Hi Katie,
My grand nephew has two deaf parents. He is turning 3 on 12/5. He has little to no language. I’m looking for Birthday and Christmas gifts that might help him to learn to speak. He goes to speech therapy for 1/2 hour per week. This doesn’t help enough. His parents are trying to get him into a pre school program. Any suggestions you can make about toys would be greatly appreciated. Thank you very much.