Hi everyone, welcome to this Blog. I’m so excited to share some fun activities to play with your little ones today.
These are all games and activities that you can play with your child if they’re a late talker to target words or sounds, or if you just want to hang out with your kids and have fun. Stay tuned.
Beans or Pasta Play:
So here in Canada, it’s spring and we are not so patiently waiting for the summer to come and sunny days ahead. But right now, there’s a lot of rain and a lot of great, kind of gloomy days.
I wanted to put together a list of activities that you’d be able to play with your child who’s maybe a little bit of a late talker, or just hang out with your kids and play. But these are some really great activities that you can do with things that you have around the house, and they really lend themselves to be able to target single words or to target sounds.
So the first game that I love is just a box full of beans or pasta or rice or lentils, whatever you have in the house. Those dried bags of beans that you’re not really using, open them up, put them in a box, and give your kids some sand toys. So maybe a shovel and a bucket, or you can give them just a spoon and a plastic cup.
You can target some great words with this activity. You can target the word in, you can target pour, more, so you can do it over and over again and again, pouring beans or pasta from one cup to the next.
It’s a great sensory activity. The kids really get to go get in there with their hands and play around, and it’s really not messy, so you don’t have paint or play-dough or sand or anything like that. And kids love it.
Fruit Peeling:
Another activity that I love is taking a clementine or an orange with maybe a softer peel and having them peel off the peel from that fruit.
It’s really great because it builds their fine motor skills, and it also helps them kind of pay attention to one activity, because they know that they’re trying to get to something inside.
So the target words that you can use are off, so they peel off. You can use the words peel, more, or again to have them take that piece off and put it down again. And it’s nice because they are helping you prepare for snack time, too.
Cheerios and Egg Carton Game:
Another fun activity includes Cheerios or some sort of toasted O cereal and an egg carton. One of those egg cartons that are made of cardboard, which you can easily poke holes in.
So you take the egg carton, you flip it upside down, and you poke holes in the top, or actually, it would be the bottom of the eggs. Then you can give your child some Cheerios, and you try to have them push a Cheerio through each one of those holes.
This is a great activity that again builds fine motor skills, but you can target the word push. You can target the word more, so you give them more, and they have to actually request for that next piece of Cheerio or cereal to push through.
Musical Play:
This last activity builds in music, which I think is so important for kids’ development, and it’s also great for turn-taking and just a great way to interact with your kids.
So take an empty Kleenex box, take off the piece of plastic that kind of stops the Kleenexes from coming out, and grab a few rubber bands. Wrap them around the Kleenex box so that you have that piece in the middle where the pieces of Kleenex come out, acting as a place where you can strum.
You can then basically make an instrument for your kids, or do it together with them if they’re old enough to do it. It’s a great opportunity for you to practice words, so you can practice any words that you have in common songs with a lot of repetition.
So Pat-a-Cake, Row Row Row Your Boat, any of those types of songs, but you can sing really any song that you want with your kids. It’s also a great opportunity for kids who maybe don’t have their first words yet, who are babbling a lot and saying a lot of sounds.
You can practice turn-taking back and forth. You can practice humming or target a specific sound. So you do like la la la or any of those speech sounds that you want to practice with your kids.
It’s a fun activity that they can then take and play on their own, and you can play together if you like.
Conclusion:
I hope you found this blog to be helpful. Don’t forget to subscribe to the blog so you don’t miss out on any of the tips or activities that I give. Helping kids develop their speech doesn’t have to feel like work, it can be fun, playful, and part of everyday life. Simple activities like sensory play, music, and hands-on games can make a big difference in encouraging little ones to talk more and build confidence. With patience, consistency, and a little creativity, you’ll see just how quickly those first words start to flow.
FAQs:
1. What are some fun activities to help late talkers?
Games like bean or pasta play, fruit peeling, Cheerios and egg carton play, and musical activities are great for encouraging speech and interaction.
2. How does sensory play help with speech development?
Sensory play, such as using beans or pasta, engages a child’s senses and encourages them to use new words like “in,” “pour,” or “more.”
3. What fine motor activities can also help speech?
Tasks like peeling fruit or pushing Cheerios through egg carton holes strengthen coordination and attention, which support communication development.
4. How can music help kids talk faster?
Musical play promotes rhythm, repetition, and turn-taking, all of which help children develop sounds, words, and conversational skills.
5. What words should parents focus on during play?
Simple, repetitive words such as “push,” “more,” “off,” and “again” are great for building early vocabulary through fun interaction.
6. How can parents make speech practice enjoyable?
By turning daily moments into play, using creativity, and celebrating small progress, speech practice becomes natural, fun, and rewarding for both parent and child.