22 Auditory Perception Activities for Preschoolers

• Read. Read to your child every single day if possible.
• Talk. Talk to your child every opportunity you get, asking him open-ended questions and encouraging him to respond.
• Nursery Rhymes.
• Music.
• Instruments.
• Musical Statues.
• Sounds.
• Listening Walk.

Auditory learners enjoy listening to and creating music. Therefore, playing musical instruments, listening to music, accompanying songs, and other musical activities will help boost your children’s auditory intelligence. You can enable them to develop their talents with musical intelligence activities for kids.

Introduction. Visual and auditory processing are the processes of recognizing and interpreting information taken in through the senses of sight and sound. The terms, “visual and auditory processing” and “visual and auditory perception”, are often used interchangeably.

Loraine, MA, CCC-SLP. The term auditory processing refers to how the brain perceives and interprets sound information. Several skills determine auditory processing ability—or listening success. They develop in a general four-step hierarchy, but all work together and are essential for daily listening.

Here are some of the changes parents and teachers can make in the environment to help kids with auditory processing difficulties listen and learn more effectively:

1. Preferred seating.
2. Use visual cues.
3. Emphasize key words.
4. Give kids a heads up when something important is coming.
5. Help with sequencing.
6. Assistive technology.

1. Practice Sequencing with Sounds. Ask your child to cover her eyes with her hands while you make a noise such as closing the door, sneezing, or playing a key on the piano.
2. Name the Mistake.
3. Clapping Syllables.
4. Sound Sort.
5. Picture Guess.
6. Listen for Sounds.
7. Outside Noises.
8. Repeat After Me.

Activities for Auditory Learners

• Record facts on video and then replay it.
• Write a song when memorizing facts or spelling words.
• Practice in front of a mirror.
• Listen to books on tape using headphones.
• Spell words out loud in different pitches and tones.
• Find a quiet space for homework.
• Use mnemonic devices to memorize facts.

Auditory learners prefer group discussions and class presentations. They like to talk about the class material and hear others discussing it.

Here are a few ways you can help your child increase processing speed:

1. Practice a specific skill. Practice can help improve your child’s speed at that skill.
2. Help your child be more efficient.
3. Work on planning and organization skills.
4. Talk to your child’s school.
5. Consider ADHD medication.
6. Stay positive.

Here’s some more information on each of these steps, and ways that you can help your child develop their auditory skills.

• Step 1: Awareness of sounds.
• Step 2: Paying Attention to a Sound.
• Step 3: Conditioned Responses to Sound.
• Step 4: Associating Sounds with Meaning.

Eight Tips to Help Your Auditory Processing Disorder Child at…

1. Reduce your child’s frustration by being understanding and compassionate about their difficulty.
2. Make sure you have your child’s full attention before you speak to them.
3. Have your child face you when you speak to them.
4. Keep instructions short.

Auditory processing activities are a tool for many auditory processing disorders or issues. From poor listening skills to difficulty with language comprehension, or auditory sensory sensitivities, activities that challenge the sense of hearing can be helpful for many children.

The musical statues game is another fun game to help build your child’s auditory perception. Play music and pause it every now and then. Your child must dance to the music and freeze like a statue every time the music stops. A variation is musical chairs – when the music stops your child must run quickly and sit on a chair.

There are a variety of good programs out there. Earobics and Fast Forward are the two that I’m most familiar with. They are both sound programs and do help with auditory processing difficulties. But, again, I would NOT use computer programs exclusively because students gain so many more benefits from one-on-one and small group work.

Auditory Processing Activities. Activities that address several different areas are helpful for kids APD: Auditory discrimination. Auditory sequencing. Auditory memory. Auditory figure-ground discrimination.