The New Language of Toys: Teaching Communication Skills to Children With Special Needs, a Guide for Parents and Teachers Review

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(More customer reviews)This book has an over-reaching title and at best is a catalog that describes toys. Placing the words "special needs" in the title implies that it would provide specific pointers for helping children with all sorts and degrees of disabilities like CP, visual impairments, hearing impairments, deafblindness, mental retardation, etc. and might at least have a section on augmentative communications. It offers VERY LITTLE on these topics. As for the dialogues, I found them to be of poor quality and contrary to other stuff I have read. Some of the dialogues for a child who hasn't begun to talk have tons of words and lots of adjectives yet later the same book suggests that teaching the concepts of 'up' and 'down' in the same play session might be too confusing for the child. I don't know what the author's Ph.D. is in but I hope it isn't in speech and language pathology.

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(2004 iParenting Media Award Winner)Many young children with special needs experience language delays and need additional help to build language skills.What better way to encourage communication development than through play? The completely updated third edition of THE NEW LANGUAGE OF TOYS, a perennial favorite of parents, speech-language pathologists, and early interventionists, offers a plan for doing just that.
The new edition presents sixty-five new toys and accompanying toy dialogs to use with children with a wide range of special needs from birth through age six.These sample toy dialogs show parents how to play purposefully with their child--using store-bought and homemade toys--to provide language learning opportunities and stimulate language development.The exercises are fun and educational, too, as parents help their child build receptive language skills (understanding), expressive language skills (communicating), and speech.
THE NEW LANGUAGE OF TOYS is organized by language developmental ages and each section includes:toy dialogs; numerous photographs; a toy list; a list of suggested vocabulary and communication concepts; children's book bibliography; a checklist to track progress.
In addition, this book provides important background information about language, its sequential development, the causes of language delays, and how play can enhance language development.It also explains the use of videos, DVDs, television, and the computer as language enhancers.The resource lists are extensive, offering toy manufacturers and catalogs, support organizations, children's book information, and suggested materials for homemade toys.
With THE NEW LANGUAGE OF TOYS, parents can help their children make gains in their language development and have an enjoyable and rewarding experience while doing it.It's also a great tool for collaboration between parents and professionals.

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Taste (The Five Senses) Review

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(More customer reviews)This is another of the five books published in 1985 by Maria Rius and illustrated by J.M. Parramon and J.J. Puig which is an ideal teaching aide and is thoroughly enjoyed by the little ones. It is geared for the preschool through first grade crowd and could quite well act as a beginning reader as well as a wonderful tool to teach the sense of taste.
The text consists of short simple sentences such as "Pastries taste good to me. So does Chocolate. Oranges are delicious. And milk is yummy." Each declarative sentence is accompanied by a wonderful color (water color) painting which illustrates the statement perfectly.
The art in this work, as with the other books in this series, have a sort of old European flavor to them. Not ancient, but the clothing the children wear and the background harkens to an earlier era...yet at the same time the two artists have added a certain contemporary look. This may seem odd, but in this case it works. Be that as it my, the painting are quite good, colorful and lively.
The author has included an illustration, anatomically correct, of the mouth, palate, throat, and taste buds along with a text of one page explaining the sense of taste in an adult mode for the use of the teacher or parent.
Not only does this work address the subject of physical taste, if flirts with the concept of exploring new tastes, evaluating taste and appreciating it. This is a wonderful little book that the teacher or parent can glean much information from in leading a discussion on the sense of taste. It is a fantastic learning tool.
I do think that the most captivating aspect of this work are the illustration which are actually as good in teaching about taste as the text, which is quite good also.
Don Blankenship
The Ozarks


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Do you remember your first realization of any of your five senses? Prolific children's author J. M. Parramn successfully tackles these tough concepts in words that 3-5 year olds can comprehend. These five colorful books awaken young minds to the wonders of the senses: the taste of oranges, the aroma of fresh-baked bread, and other sensations that give us delight in being alive. Educational, yet fun to read, this clever series is clearly written and cheerfully illustrated in flowing colors throughout. Each book includes a special "scientific" section to help parents answer their children's questions about the senses.

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Look, Listen, Taste, Touch, and Smell: Learning About Your Five Senses (Amazing Body) Review

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(More customer reviews)I was a bit disappointed that the condition in the add said 'new' but a name was written on the book. It still meets my needs...just would have been nice to know it had been written in.

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Do you know how your five sense help you? Find out how your sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch help you understand the world around you in this story about your amazing body.

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Hearing (Rookie Read-About Health) Review

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(More customer reviews)The Five Senses - Hearing, is one of five in a series by Maria Rius, J.M. Parramon and J.J. Puig which were first published in 1985 and offer information that is rather timeless. With this work, and the others in the series, you sort of get more than you paid for in that not only do you receive a wonderful little book to introduce the little ones to the sense of hearing, but you also receive a fine little beginning reader along with some wonderful art work that should and will stimulate other senses in addition to hearing.
The art work in this little book has an earlier European flavor to it that is charming in everyway, from color selection is execution of the various characters. The text consists of short declarative sentences such as "Listen to the bells ringing. Listen to the children singing...And the sound of music." The text goes perfectly with the illustrations.
The authors and illustrators have included a wonderful anatomically correct illustration of both the outer and inner ear and all of their parts along with an explanation for the adult reader to use is furthering the discussion on this particular sense.
This is a fine teaching tool and the children love it. It is best used as a discussion helper, but it certainly doubles as a read along book as well. It would be difficult to find anything to criticize concerning this particular work and I do highly recommend it. It may be getting up their in years, but the information here is good and quite workable.
Don Blankenship
The Ozarks


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The popular Rookie Books expand their horizons - to all corners of the globe! With this series all about geography, emergent readers will take off on adventures to cities, nations, waterways, and habitats around the world...and right in their own backyards.

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