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Falling For Speech and Language

Great Seasonal Activities for Improving and Enriching Speech and Language Skills

Kim Knight on November 02, 2018

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It was great getting to talk with several of my students’ parents, grandparents, and guardians at parent-teacher conferences. Always know that you can call or stop in with any questions or concerns at any time. What a wonderful Fall we have had again this year—the colors of the leaves are just incredible! This is a great time of the year to use things from your natural environment to work with your children on speech sounds and language concepts. The first thing that I notice right now is the color of the leaves and how they are falling. A number of plants, such as mums, are colorful right now too. On your drive to Wal-Mart, Grandma’s house, or home for the evening, talk with your children about the beautiful different colors; play a game where they have to find 5 things with their sound in it; or talk about things like how the leaves used to be way up high and now they are falling down to the ground, how they are under the tree, or about which pile of leaves has the most or least amount. This is also a great time to talk about the names of the different seasons and about how nature is so different in each one (e.g. leaves are just small and trees are budding in the Spring, trees are full of green leaves in the Summer, leaves change colors and fall off the trees in the Fall/Autumn, and trees have no leaves and rest for the Winter). You can also talk about the last month (October) and everything that goes with it (Halloween, etc.) and this month (November) and the activities and holidays that go with it (election day, Veteran’s Day, Thanksgiving, hunting season, etc.). You can go through the mounds of candy that your children received and help them identify candy that has their sound in it or talk about a variety of language concepts such as hard/soft, long/short, big/little, etc. Talking to your children about elections and the voting process is a great activity too—kids are so interested in things that adults get to do but they don’t. Now is a great time to talk with them about hunter’s safety. Your children are so much like sponges, soaking up a lot of information that you may never even realize you are teaching them. Use these everyday opportunities to fill your children’s imagination and knowledge base, and help enrich and improve their speech and language skills. I’m so thankful for the opportunity to get to work with such great students and people. Thanks again for the privilege of working with your children—it is truly an honor, and they are a blessing to me! I am also truly thankful for my two little blessings, Jeffrey & Colt, and for my incredible husband and family. 

Your Speech-Language Pathologist,

Kimberly S. Knight, M.A., CCC-SLP