I hope you have had a chance to read my article entitled NPL Scenario #1 – At Home With a Very Young Pat.
Now, I want to show you the processes and ideas behind what the parent will be doing with his/her child during the scenario. In reality, these processes and ideas will underlie all of your interactions – they are natural and inherent parts of your relationship, your everyday living with your child.
1. You will be interacting closely with your Child as he learns the meaning and usage of each word in his world. You will be an extremely active and interactive person in this process.
2. Learning words must be experiential – each word your child learns must be a realistic part of his life and experiences.* This learning must include as many of the receptive senses; sight, sound, movement, touch; as possible. VAKT is the code for these senses: Visual, Auditory, Kinesthetic, and Tactile.
3. The learning will begin with concrete words, e.g., Mommy, Daddy, bed, sock spoon, apple, door, chair, pillow. Later, more abstract nouns will be learned in context, e.g., "It's time to eat lunch." Verbs that are part of the child's experiences; walk, eat, run, hug, jump, will be used when appropriate. All learning of facts and concepts will be done in context, that is, they will be part of a real, meaningful experience.
4. The word and the referent will be tied together orally, written, and concrete. The child will experience the spoken word (door), the written word (attached to the door), and be looking at (visual) and touching the door (tactile, kinesthetic).
This relationship, the Word Meaning Model, will be emphasized over and over:
1. The Referent – the object; the thing that carries his food to his mouth.
2. The Spoken Word – say the word, "spoon".
3. The Written Word – spoon – spelled s-p-o-o-n. (This will be brought in later when the child is ready for this step).
5. Words will be brought together to make sentences, bringing in ‘connecting' words such as; a, an, and, the, or, but.
6. The learning will be done on your child's level and readiness to learn. The learning in child-centered. I agree with James Hymes when he said, "Your child is ready to learn at all times – it is our task as teachers and parents to determine what he is ready to learn."
7. A complete file of the learned words will be written on Word Strips which will be filed in the Word File. These words will also be used as the child's personal ‘flash cards'.
8. Left-brain and right-brain learning will take place together, reinforcing one another – music and art will be used extensively in introducing some new words. The child will be doing a lot of drawing that will be the basis for learning words.
9. Writing will begin very early – first done by the parent and moved progressively into the child's creations – creative, spontaneous writing will be encouraged.
10. There must be a lot of ‘reading to' the child.
These actions and activities should flow easily and naturally as part of your living with your child in whatever family structure or relationship that exists.
* The average child entering kindergarten has a vocabulary of 5000 or more words.
In my next article we will be dealing with Scenario #Ia - In the Stroller. Pat is still a very young child and it is time to broaden his world . Be sure to join us as we enjoy our walk .
Peter S. Pierro, EdD parentscoachesasteam.com
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