How I “Correct” My Toddler’s Errors as a Speech Therapist…

Recently, my toddler was referring to all vehicles as a “bus”. Didn’t matter if it was a car, plane, truck, etc. We call that ‘overgeneralization’ when they apply a learned skill or word too broadly. This is a typical part of language development.

As we were looking through a book and she was pointing to every vehicle, saying “bus!”, I realized she was overgeneralizing. Instead of saying to her “no, that’s not a bus!”, I simply responded with the correct word. You can see me demonstrate it in this video on my Instagram, @talkteaspeech .

Giving her the correct answer without explicitly correcting her takes a lot of pressure off. Our toddlers may have a fear of “being wrong” and we want to give them the courage to continue to try without feeling like they are always being quizzed for accuracy.

Think about how you would feel if you were being overcorrected for every little thing 😬…

Now I’m not saying there is never a time to correct because in many parenting situations, you do. But, as far as speech & language development is concerned, less pressure & less overcorrecting = more communication attempts. 🩵