How making animal noises together helps your child’s development

The joy of your child’s development is that something small and silly can actually play a big part in their life as they grow up.

Something as simple as making animal noises together can teach your child loads of skills, from understanding new words to coordinating their body. It’s also great for your parent-child bond.

In Hamza Loves Animals, wildlife expert Hamza meets a whole host of exotic creatures in Africa, including lions, elephants and monkeys.

Watch our exclusive film with Hamza to get inspired for your next play time session…

Watching CBeebies shows together

Watching TV shows together, like Hamza Loves Animals is a great way to start conversations and games with your child.

Just like in the film above, you could pause the show and chat about the different animals you've seen together and what your favourites were.

You could also see who can make the best animal sounds for whatever animal is on screen. You'd be surprised how beneficial this can be for your child's development!

Four skills your child can learn from making animal sounds

1. Pretend play and taking the lead

Making animal noises can just be the start of some serious pretend play!

As well as roaring like a lion, you might start strutting around on all fours like one! Or you could swing and hop like a monkey.

Once you've got started playing, let your child take the lead and choose which animals you'll be. This is great for keeping them engaged and opens up a whole world of conversation and chat to boost their language skills.

2. Turn taking and listening

Playing a game, like taking turns making animal noises, is great for your child's language and social skills.

Understanding that they need to wait for their turn and listen while someone else is having their's reinforces the rules of conversation and sharing.

3. Phonological awareness and vocabulary

Making specific noises - the trumpet of an elephant, the ribbet of a frog, the hiss of a snake - can help your child's articulation as they practise different mouth movements. In the film Hamza calls these 'oral motor skills'.

This also helps them to notice the difference between sounds: phonological awareness.

You can help your child link words to the sounds you make and expand their vocabulary. Words like 'roar', 'trumpet', 'hiss', 'loud', 'soft' are a good place to start.

4. Motor skills

It's really tricky to trumpet like an elephant without using your arm as the elephant's trunk.

Just like the families in the film above, you and your child can add actions to your animal noises. Perhaps hopping around like a frog, charging like a rhino, or, indeed, swinging your arm like an elephant's trunk.

Repeating actions can help your child's coordination and motor skills.

And remember to link your actions to new words for that language boost! Swing your trunk. Hop about. Slither like a snake.

It really is that simple! For more everyday inspiration to support your child's development (as well as keep them entertained) take a look at the CBeebies Parenting activities collection.

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