The Stages of Conversation

CONVERSATION IS THE MOST BASIC OF ALL LANGUAGE SKILLS

• By the age of 2 or 3 most children are enthusiastic conversationalists.
• Children who have not had the same encouragement to talk with parents may have restricted conversation skills even at 4 or 5 years
• Children without conversation feel isolated and limited in their ability to have any influence on what’s going on around them

WE USE CONVERSATION:

• To make initial contact
• To maintain friendships
• To coordinate our actions and resolve disagreements
• To learn about the world around us
• To find out what we need to learn

WE USE CONVERSATION:

• Basic vocabulary, structure and grammar
• How to join words together to form sentences
• How to identify and comment on things around us
• How to answer questions and ask questions
• How to contact another person
• How to take turns as a speaker or listener
• How to follow and keep to a topic
• How to recognise what others have not understood and how to repair the failure.

Conversation is more than just ‘talk’. We also use conversation to teach language itself.