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Fall Songs for Toddlers… All the Leaves… Therapy Tip of the Week 11.8.17

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Over the next few Therapy Tip of the Week segments, I’m going to teach you my favorite songs for fall for late talking toddlers.

 

Lots of us know Christmas carols or songs for other holidays, but sometimes we’re at a loss for songs for fall. When we don’t sing, we’re missing a real opportunity here because singing is a fabulous strategy to use to get and keep a busy toddler’s attention.

 

Many times, when a child is constantly on the go, music will stop him in his tracks!

 

When you add hand motions too, you’re making it even more likely he will listen and pay attention. Anytime we’re involving more than one sense (listening and watching), we’re more likely to be successful in our attempts to engage a child. Hand/body motions also give late talkers a way to participate and “do their part,” even when they can’t sing along.

 

Today’s little song is about leaves. To make this song make sense for toddlers, be sure that you’re pointing out the leaves falling off the trees outside.

 

The best way to do this is to sing the song when you’re outside and you can show a child the leaves on the ground and then point up to the leaves in the trees as you talk about how they fall to the ground.

 

If that’s impractical for you, you can look out the window and talk about the leaves on the trees and on the ground, or bring some leaves inside to discuss.

 

This year I found some fantastic artificial leaves at WalMart and Hobby Lobby that are perfect for this song. You can always do an extension of this activity by using these leaves to make sensory bins. I’ll be doing another therapy tip of the week about that soon – so stay tuned for that!

 

Here are the words for this song. Sing it to the tune of London Bridge and wiggle your fingers as you move your hands in a downward motion:

 

All the leaves are falling down,

Falling down, falling down.

All the leaves are falling down

On the ground.

 

The second verse includes a whole body movement – pretend like you’re raking leaves as you sing:

 

Take a rake and rake them up

Rake them up, Rake them up.

Take a rake and rake them up.

On the ground.

 

If you want to use a real prop and can find a child-sized rake, it’s perfect for this song. Otherwise, use the pretend motion for raking. This helps a child become symbolic thinkers (and language users!) as they learn to pretend.

 

The last verse has another whole body movement – jumping in place. Of course, you’ll want to include this fun part for toddlers!

 

Make a pile and jump right in,

Jump right in, jump right in.

Make a pile and jump right in,

On the ground.

 

This song has been a big hit for me for years now, and I know it will be for you too!

 

Little kids love, love, love these kinds of songs! If you need resources for help you increase your own song bank, I have 2 great recommendations for you!

 

Check out my book Teach Me To Play with You. It’s filled with songs and hand motions along with step by step instructions with goals for working with late talking toddlers during speech therapy sessions

 

The second one is my new therapy manual Let’s Talk About Taking…Ways to Strengthen the 11 Skills All Toddlers Master Before Words Emerge. In it you’ll find 300+ pages of information to target prelinguistic skills that all kids learn before they begin to talk. Check it out here.

 

That’s all for today! I’m Laura Mize, pediatric speech-language pathologist and thanks for watching teachmetotalk.com’s Therapy Tip of the Week.

 

 

The post Fall Songs for Toddlers… All the Leaves… Therapy Tip of the Week 11.8.17 appeared first on teachmetotalk.com.


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