How to Model Language During a Movie, Show or iPad Time
When our kids are on ipads often, it can feel like a big distraction and our first instinct is to take the ipad away, which often leads to our kids feeling upset. One way to support this is by using a timer and assisting them in transitioning off. However, our kids are most likely watching a show and sometimes these shows are helping our children communicate. Some kids take scenes from a movie and act them out or use a script from the episode or movie to communicate a want or need. Rather than seeing the iPad as a “bad”, it could be helpful to sit with your child and use this as an opportunity to model language and connect with your child.
Sit as close or far away as your child feels comfortable and note that if this is the first time you’re doing this, your child might be confused at first. I like to tell them what I’m doing and why to make them more comfortable. “Hey, I want to see what you’re watching, can I sit with you?”. Once you’ve given them that communication,
You can begin to interact with them and the video. Rather than asking a lot of questions, I like to model language and see how they respond (i.e., “Wow! He’s so big”, “oh no! HELP!”, “I’m so hungry”). Depending on how your child uses language, you can use first person or 3rd person. If your child is working on WH questions, maybe it is a good idea to ask who the characters are, where they are, or what they are doing, with breaks in between so they don’t get overwhelmed and feel like The interaction is a chore instead of something fun and engaging.
Not only are you teaching them language they can later use themselves or even imitate during your time together, you’re changing the ipad from something “bad” to something helpful. This also may assist with the transition off the ipad or t.v show. You are also gaining some insight into your child’s mind. If my client is singing a song or saying a phrase from a show or movie, I might even pull the video up myself to connect and relate to how they are feeling. Maybe they are singing a song about an upset stomach and it turns out, they are singing this to communicate with us and the song is the easiest way for them to communicate this.
Another option is to use the video as an opportunity to teach functional language such as “play”, “pause”, “stop”,”start”, “more”, “all done”. We can expand our models to “I want more”, “press play”, “go back”, “start it over”, “play again”. This is great language for our kids that like to rewatch clips from the video. If you’d prefer to control the computer, t.v., or iPad, you can model the language they can use to direct you, (i.e., “no go back”, “push play”, “wrong video”, etc).
When we are connected and engaged with our children, more language emerges.
Happy watching!
Author: Amber Drew, C-SLPA