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Pre-verbal communication

Infants arrive in the world with:

  • Some starting points for communication;
  • An ability to recognise patterning;
  • The capacity to distinguish their home language over others; and
  • A preference for the moving human form.

Watch the extract from the Open University video 'Simple Beginnings'.

What aspects of pre-verbal communication do you notice?

  • Poster Image

Learning through interaction

In the clip on the previous page, a parent engages her baby in interaction, helping to establish fundamental communication skills that will be needed later for conversation.


In this clip, Lesley, a teaching assistant uses the same approach with Callum, a child with PMLD.

  • Teaching assistant Lesley interacts with Callum
    1:22
Learning through interaction
Teacher and child playing with teddy bear
Q

What features characterise these early interactions?

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Features of early interactions
Child playing with teddy bear
Q

From the two clips that you have watched in this section, list the features that characterise early interactions.

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