Page 110 - Routines-Based Early Intervention Guidebook

Routines-Based Early Intervention Guidebook
Teaching Categorization 8.4

As a child’s vocabulary begins to grow, categoriza on is an important feature. It helps
children organize their knowledge in different ways, which ul mately helps them retrieve the

words they want to use and express their ideas. Think of building a categoriza on structure

like building a web of words. The more ways the word is connected to your structure, the

easier it is to pull up when you want to use it. It is important for children to understand that

there are many different ways to group objects. This will help them grow their vocabularies.
Understanding a bit about the science behind categoriza on helps us understand the

importance of working and why to work on building categories, rather than just working on

vocabulary. Think of categoriza on in terms of your desk or your computer desktop. If you
receive a bill, chances are you have a folder to put that bill in. But what about the random

things you receive that sit on your desktop. Let’s say you have a mortgage document from

buying a new house. You have no need for a folder (aka category) for that document un l you

have more than one piece of informa on rela ng to it. Your bill folder might be huge and

something you access all the me. Or, your folder with mortgage documents might become
full quickly but then you may not look at it again for a long me.

Language categories grow the same way. A child learns a word such as “doggie.” All

furry, small, four‐legged things are “doggie” un l she meets a “doggie” that doesn’t match the
category well. Let’s say she goes to a farm. Now she has these other words and needs a

group called “animals.” Another common example for young children is that all men are

“daddy” or all women are “mommy” un l they start to differen ate between uncle, aunt,

sister, brother, etc. Then a group develops. In the beginning, all colors may be red or all

shapes are circles un l we differen ate between the two and we need new names and a
group. Once the group (the category) is established, a child’s vocabulary typically grows like

wildfire and they fill it with an uncountable number of objects. When vocabulary growth is

delayed or does not follow the natural course, we can speed up vocabulary acquisi on by
building and strengthening categoriza on skills. Children typically learn categoriza on

through natural interac ons in their environment and this is the best way to teach

categoriza on to children who are struggling.

Categoriza on is the organiza on of our environment: e.g. rooms in our house,

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