The Hanen Centre | Speech and Language Development for Children

Autism Spectrum Disorder and Early Literacy: Common Misconceptions

If you have a child with autism, you may have been told to wait until he can talk before helping him learn early literacy skills. Or perhaps you heard that flashcards are the best way to prepare your child to learn to read. How do you know if you’re getting good advice? This article clears up a number of common misconceptions about helping young children with autism develop early literacy skills. Continue reading.

Article

Does Baby Sign Make a Difference?

If you Google "baby sign", you'll find claims that teaching sign language to typically-developing babies helps them to speak sooner, develop larger vocabularies, have stronger cognitive skills, and feel closer to their parents. But does research actually support these claims? If parents are looking for the best ways to support their child’s language development, is baby sign really the answer?
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Tips for Parents

As a parent, you want to know how to help your child develop the best possible language and literacy skills. So we've developed a series of practical tips to help you do just that.

They are based on the most current research and are designed to be used with young children in everyday situations.

Choose the group of tips that corresponds best to your child's current stage of communication development:

Tips for parents of young children who communicate

without words.

Tips for parents of children who have just started talking.

Tips for parents of children who talk in sentences.