Let’s talk about fostering your child’s language skills while driving in the car!

Whether they are already well on their way or in the beginning stages of language development, car rides are magical places where children are seated and potentially observant, potentially sleeping, or maybe snacking, or saying they have to go to the bathroom even though you asked them to go before you left!!! :) What a wonderful time to work on language! Here are some strategies and how we might go about integrating them into our car rides with little ones: 

Birth-24 months:

Singing! Ideally, baby songs and lullabies are great to sing in the car, although if you pop on some Katy Perry, I’m sure it has nearly the same effect. The rhythm of songs is shown to assist with learning the rhythm of language and leads to natural language development. If you’re able to add some movements to it (i.e. Baby Shark with hand movements) while stopped at red lights, even better! 

2-4 Years:

Singing! Again! Singing is great for every age because it is such an invaluable tool when learning and expanding language skills! In addition to songs on the radio, you can make up your own songs (i.e. “We’re going to the store, to the store, to the store. We’re going to the store to get some...(insert different foods/silly items each time”). This age group is likely to love this kind of activity where they can be creative and silly!

Recasting. Recasting is defined as taking what your child says and re-phrasing it to fit the grammar and syntax of English. For example, if your child says, “The car goed fast,” you might say, “Yes! The car went fast!” Or, if they say, “Me leave the store,” you could say, “I leave the store, too!” This allows your child to feel validated about expressing their thoughts and that they were understood, and allows them to hear the grammatically- and syntactically-correct way to say that sentence without directly correcting them (as that can be less than reinforcing to always have to be corrected, especially when you’re just getting comfortable with a language)!

4+ Years:

Open-Ended Comments! Start conversations after school, or after the park like this: “I wonder what was special about school today…”, “I bet you had fun going down the slide at the park…”, or “I’m curious what friends you played with...”. These open-ended comments are a great alternative to questions that can seem overwhelming or may lead them to answering in a way that isn’t uniquely their own wonderful thoughts! And it’s amazing to hear what our littles think of when we inquire in a way that lets them communicate creatively!

I Spy. “I spy something that starts with the letter __!” This is great for phonemic awareness and literacy skills for emerging readers. You can pick a familiar sound and say, “I spy something that starts with a “b” sound,” and your child can look around the car guessing “book”, or “baby”, or “bird”, etc. 

The ways you can work on language in the car are endless and we would love to hear your ideas in the comments below!

As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact us. We are happy to answer any questions you may have!