Ingredient:
- A hand puppet for you and your child
Prep Time:
Recipe for Fun!
Start a conversation between your puppet and your child’s puppet. For conversation starters, talk about their day, an upcoming event, a recent activity, favorite book or television show. Ask open-ended questions to encourage verbal communication. Take the child’s lead with the conversation and continue their storyline.
Benefits:
- Verbal Turn Taking. This is a skill that needs to be learned for effective communication where each person takes turns speaking and listening. In doing so, they learn to recognize social cues for when to begin and end their speaking turn. Puppet play provides the opportunity for playmates to practice taking turns in conversation and learning how to actively listen, process and respond to others.
- Emotional Development. Oftentimes children are apprehensive to talk about what is on their mind, whether it is about a specific situation or feelings in general. Talking through a puppet may be easier because the focus is on the puppet, not on them so children may be more willing to open up and express their thoughts.
Variations:
- Use puppets to practice weekly spelling words. State the word and have the child use the puppet to spell it out.
- Reinforce a learned task by having the child teach the task to the puppet you are controlling.
- Sing. Have the puppets sing a song and practice singing loudly or softly, fast or slow, so children practice controlling the speed (speaking rate) and volume of their voice.