108 A.

Adults help children learn the rules of conversation Conversations with children begin at birth,
long before infants understand any words. While these conversations may be one-sided at first (i.e.,
you do most of the communicat- ing), they provide the foundation upon which all of a child's future
conversations will be built. Within these early conversations, children hear their caregivers talk, and
contribute to these conversations using the communication skills available to them. Through this back-
and-forth exchange, children learn to communicate and, ultimately, to use language. Your task as an
educator is to help children learn how to interact and have conversations, starting from birth. Learning
to take part in conversations is a complex process. Conversations are like a game for two or more
players-a game made complicated because of its many rules. The only way inexperienced players
(infants and young children) can learn these rules is by playing the game with a more experienced
player (like you). Once they learn the basic rules, their ability to participate in conversations improves,
dramatically increasing their opportunities for learning language. These are some of the rules of the
"conversation game": • Initiate interactions, or respond when others initiate. • Take a turn at the
appropriate time. • Give the other person a chance to take a turn. • Pay attention to the speaker. •
Continue the conversation by taking additional turns on the topic. • Send clear messages. • Clear up
misunderstandings. • Stick to the subject (not as easy as it sounds!). • Initiate a new topic, when
appropriate. Although we expect children to have difficulty following all these rules, it's important to
note that adults have difficulty following them, too! Think of the adults you know who talk too much or
who interrupt when you're trying to speak. They consistently break the rule of giving others a turn.
People who don't look at you during a conversation break the rule of paying attention to the speaker
(making you feel uncomfortable in the process). When someone changes the subject abruptly or
mumbles, he or she is breaking the rules of sticking to the subject and sending clear messages. As
the more experienced conversation partner, your task is twofold: first, to ensure that a child has
frequent opportunities to interact and, second, when interacting with him, to help him stay in the game
and learn its rules. In Chapter 3, you learned how to get an inter- action going by following the child's
lead. In this chapter, you will learn how to keep that Learning Language and Loving It
interaction going. This skill is important for all children, but especially for reluctant communicators and
for children who are language delayed. Support children in taking turns The strategies you use to
support children as they learn the conversation game are like the scaffolds that hold up a building
while it is under construction. As construction progresses, the walls and supporting structures take
shape. As the building begins to support itself, the scaffolds are gradually removed until they
disappear entirely. Adults use conversational scaffolds when they interact with children, taking their
turns in ways that make it easy for children to take theirs. In the beginning, adults use lots of supports
to ensure that children take their turns successfully. For example, we accept any of a child's actions,
sounds, or facial expressions as his turn, even though he does not yet understand what he is
supposed to do. As he becomes a more experienced conversation partner, we use fewer and different
supports, always ensuring that we make it as easy as possible for him to take his turn. If he can't take
a turn because he doesn't understand what we've said to him, we say it again slowly or change our
words, making sure that he can take his turn and that he stays in the conversation. Many children with
language delays, even those who are Sentence Users, still need adults to support them during
conversations since their limited conversational and com- prehension skills can make it difficult for
them to know when and how to take a turn. Teachers can help children become equal partners in
conversations. Children can contribute so much more when you support them in interactions. (((0)
Chapter 4-Toking Turns Together: Helping Children Become Conversation Partners 109
110 B. Laying the foundation for conversations:
Treat Discoverers like turn-takers Infants' brains are wired for language learning. Only by being
engaged in interactions, however, can they begin to learn. Without realizing it, adult caregivers
engage Discoverers (whether they are infants or young children with language delays) in interactions
by treat- ing them like turn-takers. At this early stage, anything at all qualifies as a turn- a widening of
the eyes, a grimace, a yawn, a sound, or even a wriggle! By being treated like a turn-taker. the
Discoverer enters the wonderful world of interaction. You can lay the foundation for conversations if
you: • Talk to Discoverers as if they can talk to you • Set the stage for conversations: Help the child
develop joint attention • Make social routines part of your everyday interactions • Make turn-taking in
social routines easy for the Discoverer • Create social routines in response to the child's interests,
sounds, and actions Talk to Discoverers as if they can talk to you Watch a caregiver interact with a
very young infant and you'll see how she treats almost any thing the baby does as if it were an
attempt to communicate. When the baby burps, she says "Oh, what a big burp! Now you feel better!"
When he startles in response to a loud noise, she says, "What was that big noise?" When the
caregiver responds, she doesn't speak the way she would to an older child. Rather, she speaks with
lots of animation, exaggerating her intonation and facial expres- sions in order to hold the child's
attention and get him to respond again. The principle of "talking to the child as if he can talk to you"
applies not only to typically developing infants but to any Discoverer who has yet to discover his
power to affect others. You will notice that when caregivers talk to Discoverers, they ask lots of
questions. For example, if you sneezed and an infant looked at you in surprise, you would quite
instinctive say "Did I scare you?" rather than "I scared you!" Even though infants at this stage of lan-
guage development don't understand the meaning of the words, the question's rising intona tion
pattern seems to be interesting for them to listen to and helps keep their attention. When you treat a
Discoverer's behaviour as if it were intentional, you are establishing a pattern of turn-taking long
before he has any idea what turn-taking is about. You are giving him a turn, even though he doesn't
know it. This interaction starts out as a very one-sided affair because you take most of the turns.
Learning Language and Loving It
As an infant develops, you expect more and more from him. By seven months, he has become more
interactive and can make a variety of babbling sounds. Now, you can have long "conver- sations" with
him, making sounds back and forth to one another. Once the infant can do this, you hold out for those
kinds of sounds when you're trying to get him to take a turn, no longer accepting burps or coughs as
turns. Matthew has a developmental delay and is at the Discoverer stage. While he doesn't yet send
direct messages, his teacher treats him like a turn-taker and interprets his actions as meaningful. You
Like my glasses don't you? Set the stage for conversations: Help develop joint attention Very early on,
Discoverers get the idea of how face-to-face interactions work. They learn to look at you, make
sounds back and forth, and they love to play face-to-face games like Peek-a-Boo and Pat-a-Cake.
Interactions involving toys and other objects, however, take longer to establish. That's because the
child is not yet able to establish joint attention. He can either pay attention to you or to the object, but
not to both. Chapter 3 pages 85-88, describes strategies you can use to join in with a Discoverer and
help him develop joint attention. For example, to get a child interested in a teddy bear, you first have
to get the child's attention, so you might have to: call the child's name a number of times make funny
faces • shake the bear in front of him • playfully touch him with the bear again and again, or say, "Here
comes the teddy!" and zoom the bear in from the side. You can see that you may have to take many
turns before getting a response. However, as soon as the child shows some interest by looking at or
reaching for the bear, you treat this response as his turn. Then, once again, you take a number of
turns to try to hook him into taking another turn, using animation, facial expressions, gestures, and
exaggerated intonation. Gradually, he comes to recognize and respond to these cues more
consistently, resulting in interactions that can go back and forth for several turns. Chapter 4- Taking
Turns Together: Helping Children Become Conversation Partners 111
112 The need to help Discoverers develop joint attention applies to children with and with- out
language delay. Sometimes, an older child who is language delayed will be at the same stage of
communication development as a very young infant, as you will see with Mila in the description below.
Mila is a two-year-old Discoverer with a significant developmental delay. Her teacher, Miriam, finds it
very difficult to engage her in interactions. The one activity Mila loves, however, is when Miriam blows
bubbles for her and she tries to catch the bubbles as they fly away. When she wants Miriam to blow
more bubbles, Mila doesn't look at her - she just grabs the bottle or the wand and makes sounds. Now
Miriam wants to encourage joint attention in this natural, interactive situa- tion, so Mila can learn to
use eye contact both to request more bubbles and to share her excitement. Therefore, Miriam will
need to: • be face-to-face with Mila to make it easy for her to look at her • pause after blowing the
bubbles to give Mila a chance to take a turn • get directly in her line of vision when Mila's pauses, and
as soon as Mila makes even fleeting eye contact with her, say "More bubbles! OK!" and blow more
bubbles • follow Mila's focus of interest by pointing to the bubbles she tries to catch and commenting
on them animatedly, making sure she is close enough for Mila to make eye contact with her • draw
Mila's attention to one particular bubble (which, for example, may have landed on the ground), in an
effort to More bubbles? get Mila to look at what she points to . imitate her actions and sounds, which
may motivate her to make eye contact with her, and • continue to pause expectantly to encourage
Mila to take more turns. Miriam helps Mila develop joint attention by asking "more bubbles?" and
waiting expectantly for Mila to look at her. Miriam then enthusiastically interprets her look as a request
to continue. Learning Language and Loving It х You want more bubbles! ahhh.
While you can't teach a child to establish joint attention, you can support interactions in ways that
encourage its development. You have to work hard to make yourself an inter- esting and animated
conversation partner, tuned in to the child's interests. And you have to make it easy for the child to
tune in to you. It can be hard work to engage children who are new to the conver- sation game, but
the effects can be quite dramatic. When a child becomes an active and willing conversation partner,
he will experi- ence the power and pleasure of social interaction. You, no longer feel- ing frustrated,
can begin to view him as a conversation partner with potential. When you set up an interaction so that
the child becomes an active participant, both of you will enjoy being together. When you set up an
interaction so that the child becomes an active participant, both of you will enjoy being together. Make
social routines part of your everyday interactions Infants and children who are inexperienced turn-
takers learn a great deal from familiar, repetitive, predictable interactions that contain clear cues as to
when to take a turn. These interactions or "social routines," like Peek-a-Boo and Pat-a-Cake, are an
important part of children's earliest social interactions. Not only are they fun, but they give children
opportu- nities to interact with you just for the pleasure of your company. Through these carefully
supported interactions, children learn the basics of turn-taking and are exposed to simple, repetitive
language that helps them learn their first words. Even a child with a significant developmental or
language delay will be able to take turns within a suitable social routine. If a child is too old for Peek-a-
Boo and Pat-a-Cake, you can create routines to accommo- date his age and interests, and build in
opportunities for him to take his turn. Social routines make turn-taking easy for children at the early
stages of communication development because: • the routines have a specific way of being played •
they involve only a few actions, sounds, or words • the turns are very predictable and repetitive • each
person's turn is clearly defined, and • there are obvious cues that "tell" the child to take a turn.
Chapter 4-Taking Turns Together: Helping Children Become Conversation Partners 113
114 Social routines occur in two contexts: • simple turn-taking games introduced by the adult (e.g.,
Peek-a-Boo, Pat-a-Cake, giving objects back and forth), and repetitive, playful turn-taking activities
that an adult creates during everyday routines like mealtimes, bath time, getting dressed, or going to
the toilet. These routines always build on the child's interests, sounds, or actions. Make turn-taking in
social routines easy for the Discoverer Games like Peek-a-Boo, Pat-a-Cake, and songs like "Row,
Row, Row Your Boat" are an important part of a Discoverer's earliest social interactions. Because
initially he has no idea of what he is supposed to do, you have to do most of the work. First, you have
to get his attention. So ham it up, be a clown, and make sure you're interesting to look at and listen to.
You really have to be something of an entertainer at the beginning! You help Discoverers take turns in
a social routine if you: . Get the child's attention • Play the game or sing the song from beginning to
end a few times • Cue the child to take his turn • Treat any reaction - like a wriggle, a smile, a kick, a
burp, a sound, or a stare - as if the child has taken his turn • Take his turn for him if he doesn't
respond, then continue with the game • Once he knows the game well, expect him to take a
consistent turn Get the child's attention Be face-to-face, call the child's name in an animated way, and
greet him. If the game involves a toy, show it to him. Play the game or sing the song from beginning to
end a few times Play the game a few times to get the child familiar with it, without expecting him to do
any thing specific. Be sure you are animated and interesting so that he pays attention to what you are
doing. Once he becomes familiar with how the game is played, he will be better able to take his turn.
Learning Language and Loving It
Cue the child to take his turn The next time you play the game, pause at an appropriate spot and look
expectantly at the child, as if to say, "It's your turn to do something!" For example, if you have been
blowing "raspberries" on a baby's stomach, pause before blowing the next one and wait expectantly to
cue the child to do something to tell you to do it again. If you have been singing a song, stop at the
end of the song, look expectant, and wait for him to let you know that you should continue. Treat any
reaction - like a wriggle, a smile, a kick, a burp, a sound, or a stare - as if the child has taken his turn
When the child realizes that by kicking his feet or making a sound he's having a definite effect on your
behaviour, he'll do it again-deliberately. Take his turn for him if he doesn't respond, then continue with
the game Even if the child doesn't take his turn, keep the game going. If you wait a few seconds and
the child doesn't respond, continue playing the game. If he seems uninterested in the game, try a new
one. Liam loves the tickling game. Tickle! Tickle! Tickle! Chapter 4-Taking Turns Together: Helping
Children Become Conversation Partners 115
116 Once he knows the game well, expect him to take a consistent turn When you have played the
game over and over again and the child has come to know it well, he'll begin to get excited in
anticipation of the "fun" part. For example, just before the "Weeweewee all the way home" in "This
Little Piggy Went to Market," he'll wriggle with excitement because he knows the best is about to
come-and that wriggle will be his turn. I'm going to TICKLE you! An older Discoverer with a language
delay also benefits from social routines. When Shona waits expectantly while playing "This Little
Piggy," Habib takes a turn by shaking his foot in anticipation of having his toes wiggled. Learning
Language and Loving It After tickling Liam several times, Lena stops and waits expectantly with her
hand in mid-motion to cue Liam to take a turn. Liam opens his eyes wide and wiggles his body in
anticipation of what's to come. Lena interprets Liam's wiggle as "I'm so excited - do it again!" And the
game continues. This little piggy went.... wee, wee, wee, all the home. way
Create social routines in response to the child's interests, sounds, and actions In Chapter 3, page 86,
you learned how to join in a Discoverer's play by building on his focus and making the game more
interesting. You can: • imitate the child's actions and sounds • pick up a toy that interests the child and
move it as if it were "alive" • make yourself part of the toy • turn a chance action into a game, or • play
the "you give it to me and then I'll give it to you "game. These situations can be turned into social
routines that then become excellent opportu- nities for you to encourage turn-taking. The key is to wait
expectantly after your turn. That way, you cue the child to react in a way that you can interpret as a
request for you to take another turn. Bang. Bang Felicia imitates Jordan when he bangs two blocks
together. Bato Then Felicia asks "Bang, bang?" and waits expectantly to cue him to take another turn.
Bang, Bang? Chapter 4-Taking Turns Together: Helping Children Become Conversation Partners 117