So I’m working on speech with Jonah and I thought I would teach him the very basics of ‘back and forth’ conversation–Mainly, answering “yes or no” questions.

I have been able to teach him to answer questions from rote memory. These answers are concrete and won’t change. (“What’s your name?” “What’s your Daddy’s name?” etc)

He’s already grasped the concept of “no” and uses it consistently, especially when he is distressed and wants something to stop, (“Daddy, no sing!” when he wants me to stop singing or yelling “NOOOOO!!” when he doesn’t want to engage with me).

But I’ve found it much more difficult to teach him “yes” or “no” as an answer to a question.

I’ve realized that “yes” and “no” are open ended conceptual answers and can be used as a construct for many questions, which are much more difficult to grasp when you start to think about it.

For instance, “Is this color orange?” (yes or no)

It seems pretty straight forward, but to Jonah, conceptually, the question is the same as “what color is this?” The most important piece of information being that the color is indeed orange.

So his answer to “Is this color orange?” will be “orange.”

Teaching him to say “Yes,” is proving to be difficult.

As another example, I’ll hold a picture of Mama up and ask him, “Is this Mama?”

He’ll answer “Mama.”

I’ll try to model the answer I am looking for. “YES! –This is a picture of Mama!”

He’ll repeat me (“Yes!!”)

I’ll then ask him, “Jonah who is this?” (Pointing to a picture of Mama)

To which he will answer, “YES!” (But in this case, the answer I’m looking for is “MAMA!”)

I can see why this would be confusing for him. It’s a little bit like the old Abbot and Costello bit about “Who’s on first?”

I’ve tried a lot with other examples of “yes” or “no” questions that are much more obvious and unrelated, but as soon as I throw in a question that he already knows, like “what’s your name,” he will also answer with a “yes” or “no.”

So Jonah isn’t sure how to use “Yes” and “No” as constructs properly and I am not sure how to go about teaching this concept to him.

Thoughts?

Original Facebook Post.