How to teach colours to children with developmental delays

(Illustration 14117058Children Painting © Ewa Mazur | Dreamstime.com)

Children with developmental delays often need more time and practice to learn new skills. The same might happen when we teach them about colours. I often see parents and teachers asking children, “what is that colour?” and kids shrugging their shoulders as they are still not confident labelling colours. Children with special needs benefit from doing additional activities with colours that will help them learn and label colours.

These are the four steps to follow when teaching colours.

Step 1. Match colours

Spend time matching colours. You can use some coloured cards, red and blue, and match the red card to the red card and the blue card to the blue card. Demonstrate it for the child a few times, and then encourage your student to match colours with the same.

Step 2. Sort identical objects by colour.

Now that the child can match, you can start sorting identical objects by colour. For example, get a few red blocks and some blue blocks. Have two containers, and show your student how to put all the red blocks in a container and all the blue ones in the other container.

Step 3. Sort different objects by colour.

 This step can be a bit trickier for children. Here, we are asking children to identify different objects that are the same colour. For example, get a red block, a red crayon, a red ball and a red car, and the same items in blue. Show your student how to sort different objects that are the same colour.

Step 4. Point at colours on request.

 For this task, you can use the coloured cards you used for the matching colours task. Ask your student to point at colours on request. Start with just two colours initially, and add more as they become confident labelling.

Step 5. Now your student is ready to answer, “what colour is that?”!