Child will develop the ability to speak and/ or sign in increasingly complete, complex, precise, and varied ways.
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Encourage families to read, sing, and play with their child in their home language
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Have meaningful conversations with the child; notice what they are thinking and talk to them about it
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Pause and wait for the child to respond to your questions
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Demonstrate that you are committed to understanding children who speak a different home language than you
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Reflect on personal biases and assumptions about “proper speech.” Ask families about words and grammar from language variations with which you are unfamiliar
Child will develop their ability to listen and understand complete, complex, precise, and varied language.
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Encourage families to limit screen time and be active viewers with the child by talking about what they are seeing on the screen
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Give specific descriptions of objects, events, and activities in the child’s world (“We are going to school with the blue door tomorrow, and you will see your friends and Miss Tatia.”)
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Read to the child and have them turn the page and answer simple questions (“Where’d doggy go? Oh, there he is, under the bed.”)
Child uses language to relate to others according to the social expectations of their family, community, and culture.
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Use phrases like “my turn,” “your turn,” and “When you’re finished, can I have a turn?”
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Encourage awareness of the larger social world by participating in activities where familiar faces are seen and community is encouraged
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Take a walk around the local park
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Visit the library
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Go to the farmer’s market
Child enjoys, attends to, understands, and makes meanings from spoken and written language of storytelling and books.
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Select books that are connected to a child’s life
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Read books in the child’s home language
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Read books that take place in the child’s community or culture
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Read baby books to a child whose sibling was just born
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Read books related to the child’s developmental experiences (e.g., toilet learning )
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When reading, emphasize connections with the child’s lived experience; while reading a book about going to the doctor, for example, point out similarities to the child’s own doctor, or when reading about a market trip, comment on the foods a child might see in their local store
Child develops the ability to recognize and manipulate the different sounds in spoken language(s).
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Draw focus to words with similar endings (e.g., Oh, yes, you have a nose, and the nose smells the rose!”)
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Read stories with short sentences that emphasize rhyming sounds (e.g., B rown Bear Brown Bear What Do You See? by Eric Carle)
Child uses materials and/ or language to make meaning for themselves and/or an audience.
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Observe children’s interactions with toys and art materials
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Are they telling a story as they play?
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Are they arranging objects and marks with greater intentionality?
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Are they pretending to be a character?
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Acknowledge and extend children’s story-making
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Provide many and varied writing tools and materials, including markers, crayons, pencils, and chalk
Child views, creates, and makes meaning of visual communication and multimedia documentation, which includes drawings, collections, photographs, videos and displays.
Ways educators might support the child's development
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Take photographs of local landmarks, familiar community members, or children’s houses; make a book of them or post them in the classroom
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Document experiences that were meaningful to the child, such as a time they jumped off a step, and use the documentation to reflect on the experience with the child
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Use photographs of the children in the classroom to create a picture schedule of the day
