What to say when they don't know how to refer to themselves

What to say when they don't know how to refer to themselves

What to say when they don't know how to refer to themselves

 

Do you all know that I promote talking in the first person - so saying “I’m hungry” instead of “Mum is hungry”. But even with the best modelling, kids can get confused about how to refer to themselves. For example August says “you hungry” to tell me that he’s hungry 😂.

It can get really confusing when you’re trying to model the right way to say things, because if they say “Sarah hungry” and you model the right way to say it - “I’m hungry” then it just sounds like you’re saying you’re hungry too!! It becomes a pronoun spiral!

A sneaky tip to overcome this is to add your name to the end of the phrase/sentence when you model it. E.g.
Child: “me hot”
Adult: “I’m hot, mummy”
This way your child is more likely to get the sense that you’re talking FOR THEM instead of to them. Then you just follow up with your reply.
“I’m hot, mummy. Yes - I’m hot too, Sarah, the sun is bright today”.

Remember - without good models, your child has no other way to learn this stuff! The language isn’t in there waiting to come out, you’re teaching all the vocab and the grammar and language structure every time you talk. So taking the time to model the correct way to say something makes all the difference.

Try it and let me know how it goes. Tag a mumma who’s kid is struggling with this! They’re not alone and it’s totally normal.

 

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