This post is going to focus on how you can use common games to help develop your child’s communication skills. Today’s blog is focused on the game Guess Who! This is a game that most people know how to play that is fun and can involve many players. Guess Who cards can also be used in multiple ways to target language skills. Have a look at how Guess Who can support your child’s communication skills:
Vocabulary
- Guess Who can support the development of your child’s descriptive language vocabulary as they are required to use describing words to narrow down options e.g. ‘does your character have a brown moustache?’, ‘does yours have long hair?’)
- Build everyday vocabulary of body parts and clothing (E.g moustache, beard, hair, glasses, scarf)
Expressive language
- Encourage your child to explain the rules to you – encourage use of long sentences with conjunctions (e.g. and, then, after), and conditional words (e.g. if)
- Asking questions- this game requires your child to develop yes/no questions to help narrow down their options and guess the characters.
- Build counting skills- encourage your child to count as they fold down the character tiles following each question.
Understanding language
- Your child will need to learn the rules of the game: break parts of the game to manageable steps.
- You may want to write down some rules.
- Remind the players how to win.
- Answering questions – ask your child yes/no questions about their chosen character, they will need to comprehend the question, and answer appropriately (e.g. ‘is your character a girl?’)
Literacy
- Each character is named! Encourage your child to sound out or read aloud names of each of the characters.
Social skills
- You can model appropriate play skills – e.g. winning/losing statements, turn taking
- You can also model inappropriate play skills and allow your child to see what this looks like and to correct your behaviour – e.g. cheating, big reactions to losing
- Remembering rules and following them – remind your child about certain rules and to follow them while playing
- If your child demonstrates inappropriate play skills, talk through the possible consequences of these behaviours (e.g. if you scream after losing, others won’t want to play with you again)
- Use emotional regulation strategies if emotions become heightened to help calm your child before talking through the possible consequences of these behaviours
- Discuss strategies your child can use to calm down when playing games
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