Reading Time Speech Activities

Reading is such a wonderful way to work on lots of skills, including speech! And the best part is, with a little bit of preparation, you can do these activities almost anywhere using things you likely already have in your home.

“Lift the Flap” books

Adding photos of family members under the flap makes a book so personal for a child! When flipping through the book, ask “WHO is that?” Family members are very functional and important for a child to know. We want to make sure that they can request and identify loved ones if needed, and this is a great way to work on that skill in a fun way.

Additionally, you can add common object pictures under the flap! When working through the book, ask “WHAT is that?” Doing preferred items like their stuffie, cup, blanket, ball, car, etc. Essentially, for items that they request along with functional everyday items, we want to make sure we are practicing naming them. Asking WHERE questions for basic items is a great way to stretch this activity. Provide the child with two choices: Is it on the table OR on the plane (You can make it silly by giving an option that cannot be correct)? If the child is saying “it’s right there!” you can be silly and pretend you can’t see it. Then follow their directions to find the item. 

Regular books

If you don’t have time for cutting pictures and placing them in the book, you can do WHAT questions and WHERE questions with any book! 

For WHAT questions, do items they have interacted with or are already naming.

For example, ask “What are crayons?” if they color often. Don’t ask “What is a bowling ball?” if they’ve never bowled.

For WHERE questions, meet them where they are at. If they don’t understand when you ask them to pick something from under the table, then don’t request that they answer questions with the word under (where’s the ball? Under the table).

If a child is having difficulty, there is still an opportunity to grow their confidence! If they do not answer correctly after two attempts, state the correct answer and move on to the next. You can tell them “good effort, good try, etc.” to praise them for their hard work, even if they’re not getting it right.

If you have more specific questions, please talk with your child’s Speech Therapist, and they are more than happy to help and provide more engaging activities!