Facilitating Communication

By Laurel Falvo

I once saw a cartoon that showed a little girl walking through the front door of her house, presumably just arriving home from school. As she walked past her mother, she was saying, “What happens in kindergarten stays in kindergarten!”

Although I chuckled when I saw the cartoon, this scenario is played out in many homes where parents are frustrated by the lack of communication from their children regarding the events of the day. Whether dealing with a kindergartener or other child who may have difficulty knowing how to describe what he or she learned, saw, felt, and experienced, or an adolescent or other child who is reluctant or uninterested in talking, many parents struggle to know how to get their child to “open up” to share highlights and concerns about their personal experiences.

While ability, personality, past experiences, emotions, and relationship all likely play a role in this scenario, there are many strategies that can be used to facilitate this sort of communication. Here are just a few:


1. Visual strategies: Feelings, sequencing of events, and more can be indicated using charts, posters, pictures (both clip art and photos of the child), and games. The child can point to items, or choose a picture to describe. Linda Hodgdon’s book, “Visual Strategies for Communication” may be a helpful resource for anyone learning to help their child in this area.

2. Home school folder: When one of my children was small, I sent a notebook to school with him each day. One year (in preschool), it was a binder which contained blank pages labeled, “What did I do today?” At home, he would choose a small item (colored leaf from a walk outdoors, candy wrapper from a special afternoon snack, etc.) that represented something he had done at home that day. Whatever he told me about the item, I wrote on the paper. He took his binder to school to show his teacher, with her helping him read it if he wasn’t able to recall what he had done at home. They repeated the process at school, so that I could know a little something about what he had done at school that day. This not only facilitates communication, but it also reinforces pre-reading skills as the child dictates and attempts to later read a sentence or two about what he or she has done that day.

3. Highs and Lows: I’ve known several people who incorporate the discussion, “Highs and Lows” into their bedtime routine. As they tuck their child into bed, they ask what the high (most positive memory) of the day was, and the low (a disappointment, negative experience, etc.) For those who tend to be pessimists (or are upset by negatives), it might be best to begin with the lows, and end with the highs! More advanced individuals might use this as an opportunity to talk about choices that were made (by themselves or others) that contributed to the highs and lows, and different choices (or attitudes toward them) that could help future situations. (One of my children had a creative teacher who conducted a similar exercise in the classroom once a week. She called it a “Pow Wow.” Each child would share a low (pow) and a high (wow) during the discussion.

4. Family meeting with talking stick: A good way to ensure that family members spend quality time together, giving each other time to share their own experiences, and to listen to the experiences of others, is to hold a “family meeting.” A “talking stick” (any item, whether fancy or simple) is passed around. When a person is holding the talking stick, he or she “has the floor” for a predetermined amount of time. If that person is feeling talkative, the time may pass quickly. If not, there may be a lot of silence as their time seems to pass more slowly. The advantages to this are that each person begins to get accustomed to having time to think about what he or she might say, and the family members, who might traditionally begin talking instead of listening during a moment of silence, gives each person the time and space needed to process his or her thoughts. Also, those who may have an easier time sharing thoughts and experiences are able to model the process for those who have more difficulty in this area. (The time allowed for each person will depend on the day’s schedule and/or the attention span and ability levels represented in the family. You might begin this activity with 1 minute per person, and work over time toward 3-5 minutes).

5. I frequently use my “Social Response Pyramid(TM)” to facilitate discussions about how a person is feeling or what he or she is thinking (their CONTEXT), things he or she said or did (RESPONSES) and the STRATEGIES used (or that could be used in the future, which is part of the EVALUATION phase). More information about the Pyramid, including a KIT which provides the instruction (including an instructional DVD with sample discussions) and necessary pieces to have your own Pyramid discussions, is available at www.thegraycenter.org.

These are just a few ways to facilitate communication with a person who has difficulty sharing thoughts and experiences. I’m sure there are many more! If you’d like to share other ideas, please post those here!