More Early Attention

Speech and language therapy

﻿Hello everybody, my name's Emma, and welcome to today's session. I'm really looking forward to today's session, and I hope you are too. But before we get started, just a quick reminder, we here at Oak are trying to support any approaches you might already be using and any work that you might have already been set. We know this lesson is going out to so many different children and families. So if you're not sure, or have questions, then please contact your usual speech and language therapy team, or your child's school. In today's lesson, I'll be continuing to talk about early attention and communication development. We started this in lesson one, so we'll be building on it today. Then, we're going to spend some time thinking about the importance of adults following your lead, children, in your play. We'll have some special time. And then, through special time, I'll be setting the adults some tasks so that they can really help you get the most out of this time together. For today's lesson, all you'll need children are some toys. Adults, you'll need some writing equipment and the downloadable resources available on the Oak website with this lesson. So before we begin, find yourself a quiet place where you won't be disturbed. Turn off any distractions, including notifications or conversations that you might have running on your device. Finally, make yourself comfortable. And then when you're ready, let's begin. Okay, let's start by doing some talking and thinking about early attention. As we know, in the early stages of development, children begin to move or react depending on their situation. These early signals show feelings such as likes and dislikes. The movements are a signal that adults respond to. And, over time, these signals become more intentional. In the early stages of development, it's important that adults take on two key roles. To observe their child, and to interpret their child's messages. We can help promote the development of early attention and communication by creating opportunities through play. Play should always be natural, fun-filled, and happen as often as possible. We can also make sure that we're promoting early communication skills through all of our play by trying a few key strategies. I'd like you to pause the video to take the opportunity to have five minutes' play. Adults, I'd like you to use your stop, look and listen strategies that we learnt in lesson one. By stopping, looking and listening, you'll give yourselves the opportunity to observe what the child is doing in their play, and any messages that they might be giving you. When you've had five minutes' play, come back to the video to continue the rest of the lesson. When we talk about following the child's lead, the child must be the leader in interaction and early play. This is because, when the child is in charge of the interaction or the play, they're more likely to be engaged and attend for longer. In order to really thoroughly follow the child's lead, first you must observe what they're doing. Then you can copy and join in. When you copy and join in, though, remember to give yourself another opportunity to stop, look and listen. We need to see what messages our child is giving us as a result of us following their lead and joining in. Okay, children, it's time for some special time. I'd like you to find something that you really want to play with. You and your adult are going to get down on the floor and have five minutes of special time play. This means that you're in charge. Adults, you need to start by observing your child to see what they're really interested in. You could try copying what they're doing, or joining in with an action or activity. Take the time to stop and look at how your child responds to this. When you've had your five minutes' play, come back to the video and press play so that we can continue with the lesson. As we know, special time is fantastic for working on early attention and communication. The child gets to choose the game or activity, and the adult follows the lead. Just to refresh your memory, the golden rules for special time are that it has to be somewhere quiet. The adult gets down to the child's level, and that it's short and sweet for five minutes or so. Special time activities can be anything that your child is interested in, and that's the point. The more interested and motivated they are in the play, the more likely we're able to work on attention and early communication skills, because they're so motivated to be part of this play. I'd like you to pause the video here, adults, and take a moment to reflect on how the child responded when you followed their lead in the special time that you just had. What did they enjoy you joining in with? Once you've had a few minutes to think this over, come back to the video and press play, so that we can continue with the lesson. Play is a fantastic opportunity. It might be something that we take for granted, because it's something that we do every day, 10 times a day sometimes. But play with the child can give us the opportunity to work on such a wide range of early attention and communication skills that it's really worth its weight in gold. We can promote the child's attention, sharing of attention, turn-taking, use and understanding of nonverbal communications, as well as use and understanding of vocalisations and simple words. So it's really important that when we have our special time, we're using our most effective communication strategies and really trying to get it right to get the most out of that opportunity. Children, it's time to find something else that you'd really like to play with. Adults, this time, you're going to really focus on following the child's lead. Observe, copy, and join in with what they're doing. Then stop and look at how the child responds. You're going to build on this by then responding to those signals that they've just given you. Let's try and build special time based all around this exchange of signals between you and the child. You acting on the positive signals and messages that they're giving you, so that they're really engaging with you. Adults, don't forget to use the downloadable resource to help you to reflect on your strengths during playtime, as well as to help you think about what you'd like to learn in order to support early attention and play. You can follow the instructions in the pack to set yourself a target to develop your interaction and communication skills with your child. And you can practise these during special time. It's important that you record and reflect on how these small changes to your communication style impact on your special time with your child, and how it might change any communication or signals that your child has given you. Well, that brings us to the end of today's lesson, a really big well done on all the fantastic play and attention you've achieved today. I've got two final things I'd like you to do now. The first is a task for adults. I'd like you to look back on your notes and identify the three most important things that you've learned today. Second, if you're able to, please take a picture of your special time or some of the toys that you've chosen to play with, and record this in your special time diary. It's in the downloadable resource attached. Ask your parent or carer to share it with your teacher at school so that they can see the fantastic progress that you're making with your attention too. And, if you'd like, you could even ask your parent or carer to send a picture of your special time record book to @OakNational on Twitter, so I can see your lovely progress too. Well, all that's left for me to say is thank you. So take care, and enjoy the rest of your learning for today. Bye bye.

More Early Attention

More Early Attention

These resources were made for remote use during the pandemic, not classroom teaching.

Lesson slides

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Lesson video

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