Staten Island Writing Speaking Therapy Tutoring

A house without a foundation is like the movie The Money Pit . It is bound to crumble down. Likewise, verbal language is the basis for written and social language. Poor verbal skills result in difficulties in expressive writing, academics, and social skills. Effective writing and speaking skills are deeply connected to oral language development, as explored in insights on the relationship between expressive oral language and literacy, where we examine how strong verbal communication supports success in reading and writing.

Let us quickly introduce three types of verbal language (narrative, expository, conversational); two of them play integral parts for developing appropriate expressive writing skills. Narrative language (emerges in preschoolers) includes the ability to share experiences, describe ongoing activities, and/or plan/predict future activities, explain and tell stories.

Narrative language is different than conversational speech because the former is typically told by one speaker, while others listen. The last type of verbal language to develop is called expository language. Its main purpose is to instruct. From third grade on, students are expected to describe, define, and explain information, e.g. oral and written reports for history or science etc., in a coherent manner. As academic demands increase over the school years, there is a larger emphasis on expository verbal language and expository literacy. Learn what is the link between executive functioning and language. Download our What is Executive Functioning Pamphlet!

Narrative and expository language are the bridge between oral and written language development. Kind of like how the Verrazano connects Staten Island to Brooklyn. However, some children will require a little assistance in the form of writing and speaking tutoring to develop their narrative language skills. And that’s where we come in.

The language experts we work with are like the Olympic coaches of speech. When we are working with students, we specialize in both written and verbal skills. After all, you can’t have one without the other. That would be like peanut butter minus jelly.

Sharing is caring. We let the students know what we are doing, so they can be part of the process. We also take their interests, strengths, and learning style into account, maximizing effectiveness and ensuring the students don’t get frustrated. After all we are not trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. If your child likes music and flying saucers, let’s incorporate it! Drawing and imaginary animals? For sure! These skills are targeted during fun activities for remediation, and they are also implemented in the student’s curriculum.

When developing activities to enhance oral and written language skills, we include activities such as pictures (including drawing), books (including wordless picture books), imagination games, personal experiences, art activities, dramatic play, journals, book reports, music, editing (including collaborating to correct errors), and several other fun and effective exercises.

Find out more about our literacy tutoring services and get to know the literacy specialists we work with here! We also provide spelling intervention and vocabulary tutoring to further enrich your child’s language skills.