This communication board can help parents and carers to talk to children about being sick.
How to use this board:
Having the pictures to point at as the adult talks, gives the child more information and helps them to understand the message. The adult may ask the child if they are feeling sick and point to the pictures of the different body parts to help the child identify where or how they feel unwell. The child may find it easier to explain how they are feeling by pointing to the pictures rather than talking.
The pictures can also be used as a teaching tool to reinforce children to cover their mouth with their arm as they cough to limit the spread of germs. This could be done before a child is coughing or after they have coughed and forgotten to cover their mouth with their arm.
The adult can point to the ‘cough’ picture and say “When you cough’, then point to the elbow picture “cover your mouth with your arm” and show the child what this means by demonstrating. Then as the adult says “Then wash your hands (‘wash hands’) with soap (‘soap’) to get rid of germs” (‘germs’) they can point to the matching pictures.
Thank you, Michaela Murray, Speech Pathologist, for creating this sharable resource.
Download this communication board
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