Getting ready for language and learning: Appropriate stimulation

• Provide things that stimulate all of the children's senses - different textures, shapes, colours, and sounds.
  
• Arrange experiences that are novel, safe and challenging but achievable.
  
• Allow children to have as much freedom as possible to explore their environments, while ensuring their safety.
  
• Play games - pat-a-cake, singing nursery rhymes, peek-a-boo.
  
• Provide positive feedback in many different ways - mirroring actions or facial expressions, mimicking sounds.
  
• Speak to children often, even though they are too young to understand. Children learn the sounds and rhythms of language before they speak.
  
• Read books out loud with your children.