Playtime: Teaching Parents and Professionals How To Promote Peer Interactions

1. Playtime: Teaching Parents and Professionals How To Promote Peer Interactions Corey L. Clemente, Ph.D. CCC-SLP Radford University 6th Annual Infant & Toddler Connection of Virginia EI Conference April 30, 2008

2. Why Peer Interactions? • Playing with peers is important! • Through peer interactions, children learn to: • See things from another person’s perspective • Make compromises • Resolve conflicts • Share, collaborate, and cooperate • Negotiate and assert themselves

3. What We Should Expect… • Many children naturally develop the ability to interact well with peers… • By the age of 3 years, children in a group setting should interact more with their peers than with their teachers • Between 3 and 5 years of age, children who interact most often with their peers are also the ones with the best-developed language skills

4. Pre-Requisite Communication Skills for Peer Interactions • In order to interact with peers, children should be able to: • Initiate interactions • Respond when others initiate • Send clear messages • Continue the conversation (take turns) • Clear up misunderstandings • Stick to a subject • Children have difficulty interacting with peers if they: • Seldom initiate or respond during peer interactions • Initiate or respond inappropriately • Don’t persist if their first attempt to communicate with a peer fails

5. By the age of 3 years…children should demonstrate the following behaviors with peers: • Getting a peer’s attention • Being a leader in an activity • Imitating a peer • Expressing affection toward a peer • Expressing hostility toward a peer • Following or refusing to follow a peer’s request • Negotiating an acceptable solution • Playing in a group for a relatively long time • Our job, then, is to PREPARE our infants/toddlers to engage in these interactions with one another…

6. The Role of the Parent/Caregiver in Facilitating Peer Interactions • For children with special needs, there are several barriers that keep us from emphasizing peer interaction skills: • The training of parents • Once provided with minimal instruction, parents are capable of learning and implementing interaction-promoting strategies between children and their peers (Girolametto & Weitzman, 2006) • The training of professionals • So focused on individual needs and goals of children…tend to neglect peer interactions • With specific training that targets group skills, EI professionals become confident/competent in targeting peer/pragmatic skills among children (Craig-Unkefer, 2002; Guralnick & Neville, 1997) • Once we get past these barriers… • HOW do we target these skills?!

7. Questions that we need to Ask and Answer • How many children should be included in a group? • Who should be grouped together? • How do I set up an appropriate activity? • How do I monitor the child’s level of involvement in the activity? • Levels of Involvement • Types of Play • How do I adapt my responses to each child’s needs?

8. The Answers… • Limit the groups to 3-4 children • Group children who will be a good “mix” based on levels of involvement and types of play • Choose activities that: • Are interesting to all of the children • Match each child’s abilities • Do not involve too many materials • Allow you and the children to be on the same physical level

9. Types of Play • Functional Play • Begins in the 1st year and peaks between 2 and 3 years of age • Constructive Play • Begins in the 2nd year and peaks between 3-4 years of age • Dramatic Play • Begins in the 2nd year and peaks between 6-7 years of age • Games with Rules • Begins at about 6 years of age and continues throughout adulthood

10. Conversational Styles • By looking at how frequently children typically initiate and respond during adult and peer-based interactions, we can identify different conversational styles… • The Sociable Child • The Reluctant Child • The Child with His Own Agenda • The Passive Child

11. How Much Does Your Child Interact During Play? • No social interaction • Non-play behavior • Unoccupied • Onlookers • Solitary Play • Minimal Social Interaction • Parallel Play • Lots of Social Interaction • Associative Group Play • Cooperative Group Play

12. Levels of Involvement • Attention • Are the children showing interest in the activity? • Are the children attending to and reacting to what you and the other children are doing? • Participation • Are the children actively participating in the activity and handling the materials? • Interaction • Are the children interacting with you and with the other members of the group? • Levels of Involvement may vary depending on the children’s different conversational styles…

13. If your child is: Your goal is to: • Not attending • Not participating • Not interacting • Attending but not participating or interacting • Attending and participating but not interacting • Attending, participating, AND interacting • Help your child attend and become aware of what the activity has to offer • Encourage your child to use the materials and get involved in the activity • Encourage your child to initiate to you or their peers • Engage your child in extended interactions, ensuring that no single child controls your attention in the group

14. If your goal is to: You can adapt your response by: • Help your child attend and become aware of what the activity has to offer • Encourage your child to use the materials and get involved in the activity • Encourage your child to initiate to you or their peers • Engage your child in extended interactions, ensuring that no single child controls your attention in the group • Change or adapt the activity; • Make your language easier to understand; • Change position so that you are face-to-face • Invite your child to join in; • Wait expectantly for him/her to join in…; • Wait! Follow your child’s lead; • Respond promptly to any initiation • Use sincere ?s and comments to keep your child in the conversation/interaction

15. Activities and Scenarios to Consider… • Set up an environment to bring children together • Provide large pieces of equipment that encourage interaction • Adapt play activities • Provide toys for all development levels • Provide duplicate toys • Provide an appropriate number of toys • Set up the environment so that you and the children are face to face!

16. Brainstorming:Books, Music, Snacks, and Art • Books • Dialogic Reading (Whitehurst et al., 1994) • Music • Snacks • Arts and Crafts

17. References:Research and Resources • Craig-Unkefer, L.A. (2002). Improving the social communication skills of at-risk preschool children in a play context. Topics in Early Childhood Special Education, 22(2), 3-13. • Girolametto, L. & Weitzman, E. (2006). It Takes Two to Talk™ —Th e Hanen Program® for parents: Early language intervention through caregiver training. In R. McCauley & M. Fey (Eds.), Treatment of language disorders in children (pp. 77-103). Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Publishing. • Guralnick, M., & Neville, B. (1997). Designing early intervention programs to promote children’s social competence. In M. Guralnick (Ed.), The effectiveness of early intervention (p. 579-610). Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co. • Manolson, A. (1992). It Takes Two to Talk. Ontario, Canada: Hanen Early Language Program. • Weitzman, E., & Greenberg, J. (2002). Learning Language and Loving It: 2nd Edition. Ontario, Canada: Hanen Early Language Program.