How to Help Your Child Improve Their Oral Expression Using Improvisation

Improv is a game, but it revolves around a skill we use to carry out spontaneous or unplanned actions. Improv games can be a great way to overcome the main challenges of public speaking, such as the fear of being ridiculed or the fear of making mistakes. But improv also has many other benefits! This fun and useful activity can also help your child do the following:

• Feel more comfortable in their own skin
• Build self-confidence
• Improve their syntax
• Practise their pronunciation
• Organize their ideas
• Use their voice
• Employ non-verbal language
• Establish good rapport with others
• Process information quickly
• Think on their feet (give quick answers)
• Find the exact words they’re looking for
• Become a better listener
• Etc.

All you need to organize a family improv night is a few themes to draw from a hat, a timer—so that no one goes over their allowed time—and a little imagination! To add to the fun and make things more challenging, try setting a different rule for each scene. Here are some examples:

• The scene has to be performed silently (miming only)
• Everyone must speak in rhyme
• Everyone has to lie on their back
• Each line must be sung
• No one can use the letter A (they have to replace it with another vowel)
• Everyone has to speak as though their mouth is full of marbles
• Etc.

This is a great activity that’ll liven up your dinner table. Invite your child to be the emcee for the evening: each family member will play a guest and take turns answering their questions on the fly. You can give your child a few tips on how to be a good host:

• Ask open-ended questions (e.g., questions beginning with “Why,” “How,” “What,” “Can you describe”)
• Listen when your guests are speaking
• Maintain a positive demeanour (e.g., smile, don’t cross your arms)
• Etc.

Asking your child to come up with and present a new ending to a story they’ve just read or a classic they know by heart is another creative way to help them practise oral expression. You can turn this into a special activity by encouraging your child to do the following:

• Perform while standing in the middle of the room or on a sturdy platform
• Hold a pretend microphone (e.g., a wooden spoon)
• Pay attention to their intonation
• Use punctuation to give their words a sense of rhythm
• Etc.

Word toss is a simple game that’s all about thinking on the spot. Taking turns in a circle, each player must say a word that’s connected in some way to the one before. Here are some examples to give you a better idea of how the game works:

• Potato, poutine, meal, family, sister . . .
• Cloud, rain, plant, green, forest . . .
• Pink, candy, Halloween, orange, pumpkin . . .
• Etc.

This activity is as silly as it is fun and will help your child shake any fears about public speaking! All you have to do is place a chair in the middle of the room. Then, have players take turns walking around it for 30 seconds while having a conversation with an invisible occupant!
Try giving the players different challenges:

• Speak with an accent
• Pretend to be your favourite movie character
• Talk like a duck
• Pretend you’re feeling incredibly tired
• Etc.