We have created the Let’s Listen and Talk Preschool Programme to provide you with the information, advice and support you need to help your deaf child continue to develop their listening and speaking skills at this exciting phase in their growth and development.
You are your child’s best teacher
At The Elizabeth Foundation we strongly believe that families and carers are the most important teachers of their children and you have a vital role supporting your child’s development. But we also appreciate that sometimes you need support and ideas to help you do this. Whether you have participated in the Baby or Toddler courses, or this is your first experience of Let’s Listen and Talk, the Preschool programme provides you and your family with the knowledge, confidence and skills to support your child.
During this course, we will help you:
- learn about some of the ways your child’s skills and abilities might develop as a preschool child.
- better understand how you can support your child’s development at this important time before they start school.
- think about some of the important issues facing you and your child over and above the development of their language and communications skills and signpost additional materials that might help you. Issues relating to:
- technology including radio aids and soundfield systems,
- language development and literacy,
- social development: emotions, friendships and behaviour
- look – in later lessons – at how you might go about selecting the best school for your child and make suggestions as to how you can then prepare your child – and the school! This will also include information about:
- how you ensure your child has appropriate support within their school environment
- and, equally importantly, who can help you secure this support
- understand how to provide the necessary feedback at the end of each lesson so that we are able to support you through the Preschool programme.
About the lessons
We have divided the Preschool programme into lessons that take you through different phases in your child’s development, focusing on a range of topics.
Each lesson in the Let’s Listen and Talk Preschool programme includes:
- an explanation of the lesson topic and why it is important – at all times we will be relating this topic to listening skills, understanding and spoken language.
- ideas for activities for you to try at home to extend these skills along with supporting video clips to help you understand and provide examples.
- supporting guidance papers where appropriate to extend your knowledge.
- an end-of-lesson feedback form which will help you to assess your child’s progress and provides your course leader with monitoring information which, in turn, will enable them to support you and your family through the programme.
Take a look around this sample lesson – it won’t record your progress as this facility only works if you are enrolled on the programme. You will also not be able to see or complete the end of lesson feedback form.
Click the ‘Mark Complete’ button (if visible) to record your progress and move on to the next page.