These conversations don’t have to be planned. They don’t have to be about any specific topic. One of the privileges of parenthood is sharing your own ideas and thoughts, opinions and beliefs with your child. After you get home for the day, or before taking them to childcare or school, after a game or a favorite show, remember to take time to talk and listen to your child.
Many conversations will occur on the fly, while you are driving or cooking or shopping. It is important to try to find a few times during the day to really focus on your child’s conversation. Physically getting down to their level is a wonderful thing to do. When you do this, they know you are interested in them, and paying attention. They can see your face as you talk and you will be responsive to their words, responses and facial expressions.
As preschoolers grow, routines such as doing laundry, putting dishes away, picking up toys, making beds and washing the car give them a chance to learn more words for household items, rooms in the house, parts of a car and many other categories.
As kids get older, their world expands beyond their home and child care settings and beyond daily routines. Missoula is a wonderful hometown for many reasons and one of them is that it provides many special ways for children to learn with their families. Here are just a few.
Look for the letters! Our town has some letters that are bigger than life. The mountains have an L and an M, with a zigzag trail that makes some Zs. Add to the mix our wonderful Xs and you have the beginnings of a great family activity. You can drive, walk, or often just look out the window at the letters, or you can look at pictures of them. Before you start you might want to read “Chicka Chicka Boom Boom,” by Bill Martin, a great book about letters. Like all the books mentioned in this article, it is available at the Missoula Public Library. Take a piece of paper and pencil with you when you look for the letters. Parents start by thinking of some words that start with M, L or Z or end with X, and writing them on a list, doing one letter at a time. Encourage kids to add their ideas. Before you know it you will have a full paper to read to the kids. To celebrate this accomplishment you could eat some alphabet soup. To follow up, parents could point out a few letters on signs as they walk or drive, or on food packages as they get dinner.
Another “only in Missoula” vocabulary activity can occur at the fish sculptures at the park along the river, just east of the Higgins Avenue bridge. You could stop at the library first and read “Rainbow Fish” by Marcus Pfister. Playing by the sculpture gives parents a chance to talk about the direction words on, under, next to, between, behind and in back of. You could all munch on Goldfish crackers afterwards.
Of course a trip to the Carousel is rich in words. Horses, saddles, poles, shine, paint, platform, line, gate, cost, token, stop, start, faster, slower, off, on, dragon, gargoyles, carving, organ music are just a beginning. Parents could stop by the library and look at “A Carousel for Missoula” by Sherry Devlin before they take their ride.
We learn words through all five senses, and a trip to the Farmers Market can give parents a chance to talk about smelling sweet lavender, seeing huge beautiful sunflowers, hearing all the conversation and laughter, and tasting and touching a great big cookie. A good read before or after your market trip might be “How Are You Peeling: Foods With Moods,” by Saxton Freymann. When it is not market season, a trip to the grocery store can provide a fruitful source of new words and food for thought.
The very best place in Missoula for teaching and learning words might well be your own living room, bedroom, or kitchen table. That is where you can read storybooks, old and new. Books provide words that our experiences can’t teach. We can learn of deserts, oceans, subways and covered wagons. Books are a wonderful way to learn words, and parents who read to their children are giving them a head start toward learning to read.
Remember: I-t is very important to talk to young children and read to them every day. You are their first and best teacher.
Each month the Missoulian Health page features a column by the Healthy Start Council of the Missoula Forum for Children and Youth, a coalition of groups and individuals working collaboratively to help Missoula’s kids grow up to be healthy and resilient. Missoula County Public Schools is a member of the Healthy Start Council. Janice Nugent is a Speech and Language Pathologist for MCPS and can be reached at 728-2400, extension 5031.
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