I had been riding a boat since I was a child, letting the two oars carve a path through rough seas.
One day, when the boat was damaged and brought back to the beach, a boy from the firefly village told me that a woman had sent a postcard. How she knew where I was remains a mystery to this day. After a long phone conversation, she came to that remote village. Together, we repaired the damaged part of the boat using the stylish metal fittings she had brought with her.
The time we spent that early morning, working side by side, passed in an instant. She spoke to me about trends and later, the fleeting nature of those trends was proven true. Perhaps she, too, was searching for her own path.
I came to understand everything only later: my path was not somewhere out there, but my own life one I could not control. I am writing this poem to tell her that. But at that time, we were so absorbed in each other that nothing else existed.
We faced each other, feeling as though we had drawn closer to ourselves. As the day ended and the boat grew dark, we slowly synchronized the flicker of our souls with the fireflies of the village on each other’s skin, in each other’s hair. Since we were going nowhere, the boat became filled with a rich, inner silence.
Biography of Taro Hokkyo
1998 Rekitei Shinei Award in Japan.2021 Arab Golden Planet Award. 2022 Awarded the title of Doctor of Letters from the Arabic-speaking world.2023 My poems are published in Orfew.al magazine in Albania. Also translated into Italian2024 My poem is published in the Daily Global Nation in Bangladesh. My poems published in Samantaral Bhabna, India. Interview with an Algerian newspaper is published. My poem is published in Greek Police Magazine. Received a certificate of honor from English poets. Published in a Korean magazine.
Published in Koltaka jishu International Poetry Magazine, India. My poem is published in a Greek e-magazine. My poem is published in the Barcelona Literary Magazine. My poem is published in Poetry Planetariat, a Nepalese poetry magazine. My poetry collection is published in Bengali-speaking countries. Three of my poems were published in India’s Half-yearly magazine. Three of my poems were published in the Raft of Dreams Literary Magazine. My poem is published in Hyperpoem in Nepal.
SPEECH DEVELOPMENT DEFICIENCIES IN PRESCHOOL CHILDREN AND WAYS TO OVERCOME THEM
Navoi State UniversityPreschool Education Program,
3rd-year student
Yarmamatova Sevinch Elyor qizi
Abstract
This article analyzes the main deficiencies encountered in the speech development of preschool children, their causes, and effective pedagogical approaches to overcoming them. The topic is also relevant for foreign preschool educational institutions, and the importance of early pedagogical intervention in developing children’s language competence is highlighted.
Keywords: preschool age, speech development, phonemic hearing, speech therapy, communicative competence, pedagogical technology, language development, early intervention, vocabulary, articulation exercises.
Introduction
Speech is the main tool in children’s socio-psychological development and forms the foundation of thinking, communication, and learning processes. During preschool age, speech development occurs rapidly; however, due to various factors, some children may experience delays or disorders in speech development. Such conditions negatively affect later stages of reading, writing, and social adaptation.
1. Main Speech Development Deficiencies
1.1. Limited Vocabulary
Many children have a vocabulary level below age norms. This makes it difficult for them to express thoughts consistently, answer questions, or engage in communication.
1.2. Underdeveloped Grammatical Structure
Errors in sentence construction, incorrect use of cases and tenses, and inability to arrange sentence components coherently are commonly observed.
1.3. Speech Sound Disorders
Sound articulation disorders such as sigmatism and rotacism, sound substitution, or omission are widespread among children.
1.4. Deficiencies in Phonemic Development
Children’s inability to distinguish or correctly perceive sound differences in words can later lead to difficulties in literacy acquisition.
1.5. Insufficient Communicative Competence
Shyness, inability to express thoughts freely, and poorly developed dialogic skills are also significant issues in the speech development process.
2. Causes of Speech Development Deficiencies
Insufficient Speech Environment in the Family
Limited verbal interaction with adults or excessive exposure to screen-based media slows down speech development.
Pedagogical Neglect
Failure to provide age-appropriate speech activities and lack of active engagement in communication.
Psychological Factors
Stress, fear, and attention deficits can hinder speech development.
Biological Factors
Prenatal or perinatal injuries and hearing impairments affect speech formation.
3. Ways to Overcome Deficiencies and Methodological Recommendations
3.1. Enriching the Speech Environment
Reading books to children, daily conversations, and role-playing games help expand vocabulary.
3.2. Speech Therapy Sessions
Regular activities such as sound correction, articulation gymnastics, and exercises to develop phonemic hearing are essential.
3.3. “Early Development” Programs
Sensory development activities, communication games, and kinesthetic and visual materials have a positive impact on speech development.
Yarmamatova Sevinch Elyor qizi was born on July 11, 2005, in Khatirchi district of Navoi region.She graduated from General Secondary School No. 39 in her district. Currently, she is a third-year undergraduate student majoring in Preschool Education at Navoi State University. From an early age, Sevinch has been deeply interested in poetry and literature. Her goal is to become a highly qualified specialist in her profession and to share the valuable knowledge she has gained with future generations.
I still recall the last time I spoke to an alien, or perhaps merely imagined it to be so. It happened immediately after the first drops of blood—later known as menstruation—appeared. I curled up in a corner, watching the wall where it walked in transparent attire, playing cards next to a widow spider. I don’t know if it was truly a widow, but perhaps my mood at the time made me assume it.
From that moment, I imagined Eve dreaming of the respectable apple. Imagined her exhausted, suffering the cycle. Imagined her startled by the fact of her femaleness. I saw her in my mind attempting to flee the obsessive-compulsive disorder, the doubt, and the petty anxieties. Imagining herself pregnant, her belly immense, and her legs swollen from fluid retention. I pictured her with one eye open and one eye closed, like a resting wolf. Then the alien suddenly stung me; I opened my eyes and found it wearing Adam’s mask, recounting the familiar story from the perspective of the victim who fell into the trap of temptation.
No Bigger Than a Chickpea
Do you remember?
When I knelt before you, crying?
When you smiled at me and explained
Why did a piece of my body have to be cut off?
Do you remember?
You said,
“You won’t feel a thing.
It’s no bigger than a chickpea.”
My mother was boiling mint leaves.
I swear I felt the pot weeping.
Every leaf of mint seemed to ache,
As if preparing for a funeral.
You wore a loose, colorful galabiya.
You were laughing,
Genuinely happy, waiting for the line of girls—
So you could circumcise them.
It was the first time I heard the word.
I thought it was something
Like trimming your nails.
And I thought
You were like the school nurse.
We were laughing so hard,
Chasing one another,
Waiting for our turn.
The mother of each girl
Whispered to her:
“Once they cut that piece from you,
You’ll be a good girl.”
Do you remember?
Do you remember how all the girls begged you
When you pulled out the blade?
We thought it was a joke.
We thought it was a game.
But we never knew
We were part of it.
What the Palm Reader Told Me
A palm reader tells me I’ll end up working as a clown.
She says it with a wide smile shaped like a swordfish.
“You’ll live until sixty,” she says.
“And on the day you retire, you’ll take off your shoes in the street and run in the opposite direction of the traffic light.
That’s when you’ll start speaking Chinese—
The language you always dreamed of learning one day.
You’ll say xiè xiè—thank you so very much—
To everyone you meet.
It won’t bother you that the street vendor replies,
‘You’re welcome, Grandma.’
You know he has no manners.
And even though you used to get upset every time he said it,
This time you’ll run—run fast—all the way to the end of the road,
Like a child, like a nightingale eager to sing,
Happy with her voice and showing off a little.
The city’s chaos won’t annoy you then.
Nor the pollution,
Nor the skyscrapers,
Nor the smell of antidepressants.
You won’t think about how many times your father kissed you on his deathbed,
When he closed your eyes with a smile
And you thought he was playing.
You’ll just keep running and running
Until you bump into the throne of the Divine.
And you’ll reach out your hand,
Take a violet rose from it,
Plant it in the hollow of your chest,
And begin again.
A Thumb-Sized Sinbad under My Armpit
Beneath my armpit lives a Sinbad the size of a thumb.
His imagination feeds through an umbilical cord tied to my womb.
Now and then, people hear him speaking through a giant microphone—
Singing,
Cracking jokes,
Laughing like mad,
And impersonating a lonely banana suddenly abandoned by its peel.
The men of our town have no idea I carry a Sinbad inside me.
They say, “A woman—formed from a crooked rib.”
They say, “A woman—waiting for Prince Charming.”
But Sinbad stirs within me like a fetus,
Restless, chasing after adventure.
My aunt pinches my knee
For slipping into daydreams.
The good girls say yes.
But what about no?
What about what Sinbad tells me every night?
No one knows.
No one cares.
.
Thus Spoke the Orange Tree
Yesterday I met an orange tree and asked it, “Tell me, how we fold Time?”
To be born now, a thousand years old. To know how to understand man, beast, bird, insect, flower, and machine. How to walk naked on my tiptoes in a wintry open space, without fearing the cold. To sing at the top of my lungs because (am still breathing)
Without fearing the sirens or the police.
Yesterday I met a pregnant orange tree and whispered in her acrobatic ear, “How do you become an orange tree, then give birth to a moon? How do the jokes melt in your mouth like water with honey? Did you fall for an angel? Or did you read a poem of light? Do you wear crystal balls like cosmic spectacles?”
Yesterday I shed my skin, bone, and flesh like a temporary coat I no longer needed. Yesterday I broke free of it. Broke free of me. And raced at full speed to catch a star that accidentally fell from a baby’s eye. I called out to myself with a thousand foreign tongues, and I prayed. And I sighed. And melted, once more, into the drink of Love.
First Class Donkey
Yesterday I sat next to a donkey in first class. His eyes were pearls, his heart a green stone. When I slipped my hand out from under the seat belt to hold him, a piece of the full moon fell into my lap. I froze. The old stammer from fifth grade came back. My father’s voice in my ear: You’re still shy? It’s a donkey. But I wanted to hold him even more. His heart buzzed like a bee— maybe he could fly, maybe speak, like the ones in Orwell’s farm. His eyes: a fountain of hope. Could a gaze swallow me whole? Could he pull me toward him, inch by inch, until my body vanishes— no one finding me, no one seeing me except him? And the flight attendant? Would she report me missing? Or swear I was never there? The donkey holds a newspaper with a hole in it. I wonder: old-fashioned donkey? I lean closer, resisting the urge to hug him. His gentle eyes tempt me. Closer— I’m already there, inside the hole, second from the right on the obituary page. I’m there, dreaming.
The Play “A SHERLOCK CAROL” Brings a Barrage of Ghostly Mysterious Fun Lyrics Stage
Two prodigious masterworks that pair well as a theater couple. Additional surges of hilarity and plotting make this cup of yuletide merriment a seamless holiday indulgence for all.
A SHERLOCK CAROL
Dec. 14-December 21
Running Time: Two hours plus one 15-minute intermission.
Moriarity is as dead as dead can be. Sherlock Holmes is despondent. Deprived of his number one opponent, what’s the use of it all? Arrive a fully-fledged Tiny Tim and the cagy bereavement of everyone’s beloved humbug and it’s a jolly literary mash-up with wonders around every corner. This renewed and delightful reimagining of two of the most cherished literary characters is a “Dickens” of a yuletide gumshoe story that’s as “good as gold.” Six actors transfigure before your eyes in a spirited, clever, and jubilant holiday humor that is “elementary” for a celebratory outing sure to pleasure audiences of all ages.
With clever and spooktacular staging that has garnered rave reviews and has been described as impressive by a plethora of theater critics, A Sherlock Carol utilizes the medium of genre blending uniting Doyle and Dickens to scare up light hearted mysterious Christmas fun with rapid fire British accents to boot! The costume changes were swift, smart and operative and the sharp tongued, at times, caustic dialogue which was further animated with a pronounced British accent made for a lively busy never a dull moment type performance. There were so many nuances happening on stage, I felt a pressing need to pay attention to everything because I didn’t want to miss a thing! There was romantic interest drama which brought an understated simmering sensuality that made good adult erotic stimulation and interest. With awe aspiring visual effects along with some characterizational surprises, there was never a dull moment.
During the intermission, some of the men were buzzing in the men’s room about how the play really “came alive” during the second act which incited a fiery debate in between the sounds of flushing urinals. Even if you’re not familiar with the mysteries of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or the campy ubiquitous classic A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, there is enough context to facilitate your enjoyment of the play as a standalone presentation. The play manages to get philosophical as some thematic elements were clearly rendered with lines like, “You’re not afraid of dying, you’re afraid of living!” Which to me was an eye-opening moment, as was also expressed by my guest sitting next to me; and if anything was a meaningful take away from this disparate play. The great chemistry between the actors made for a seamless light hearted and essentially comical experience that left audiences leaving with childlike smiles on their faces. Sherlock Carol effectively delivered a new campier version of two literary icons; I highly recommend you see this one. Five out of five stars for what it was!
Jacques Fleury
Jacques Fleury is a Boston Globe featured Haitian-American Poet, Educator, Author of four books and literary arts student through Harvard University. His latest publication “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self” and other titles are available at all Boston Public Libraries, the University of Massachusetts Healey Library, University of Wyoming, Askews and Holts Library Services in the United Kingdom, The Harvard Book Store, The Grolier Poetry Bookshop, amazon etc… He has been published in prestigious publications such as Spirit of Change Magazine, Wilderness House Literary Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, Litterateur Redefining World and Cooch Behar anthologies out of India, Poets Reading the News, the Cornell University Press anthology Class Lives: Stories from Our Economic Divide, Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene among others…Visit him at: http://www.authorsden.com/jacquesfleury.
Jacques Fleury’s book You Are Enough: The Journey Towards Understanding Your Authentic Self
A carnival barker is trying to convince me that, for a modest sum, I could enter the mind of another person and retain all of his or her thoughts, dreams, emotions, and memories. While it was a tempting idea, I thought it would be horrible if that worked both ways. What if that person retained the essence of me while I was poaching the essence of them?
I looked around the fair and wondered when it had become something like Ringling Brothers, Barnum, and Bailey in a Kafka story like the prelude to Amerika or The Starving Artis? I heard lions roaring inside circus tents and saw elephants hanging out by a peanut gallery where a puppeteer was doing Punch and Judy shows with masked figures who strongly resembled Celebrity Death Match Claymation characters modeled after current politicians. I asked the barker who was now dressed up in a clown costume, whether I could choose whose mind I could borrow for the evening and he said, ”Sure, but that costs extra.” I was afraid to ask how much but he must have peered into his crystal ball and assured me that there were several convenient payment options, layaway plans, credit card loans and even an extended pay option that sounded like a 30-year mortgage with low financing that was a limited time offer. All I had to do was sign here and we’ll go to town. I have a pin for the blood-letting you’ll need to sign the oath. “Don’t worry, “ he assured me, “it only hurts for a little while, then you just get used to it.”
Lunch with Charlie: an Anxiety Dream Poem
All the buildings look like turn-of-the-last-century Utica brownstones but I think we are actually, in Albany. I’m trying to get downtown on foot but somehow find myself on a bus that takes the wrong fork off the main road into a different city that looks like Utica but could be Schenectady. I pull the overhead stop wire that signals the driver to stop but he doesn’t and the wire snaps. The driver arbitrarily, abruptly stops, stands up, and says, “Last stop everyone out.” And he forces all of us out into the middle of nowhere. Luckily my old boss is driving by in his vintage Caddy, picks me up and suggested we stop for lunch at Hymie’s Pork Shop in Troy which is always the next stop after Nowhere on the bus line. Then I’m sitting at a table with a movie star and some local political movers and shakers all of whom are friends of my boss who seems to have disappeared. The star turns out to be Charlie Sheen and he has a bandage on his right cheek that covers a wound from one of his old movies. Charlie is affable and funny and I feel very comfortable with him all throughout an extremely long lunch and after. Later, in the Caddy, I tell my boss about the great time I had at lunch with Charlie and he says, “You were lucky. He can turn on you like that.” And he snaps his fingers. I ask him where we are going now and he says, “Downtown.” But I’m afraid to ask him in what city.
Dream Lottery Anxiety Poem
This is what it must feel like to win the dream lottery, I thought. All I had to do was give the patron’s pet turtle his daily walk, on a leash, and I could collect an all expenses paid overnight trip to London for a first run new play at The Savoy.
Once I had hooked the turtle up On his leash and we began our walk I could see this was going to be much more difficult than I originally thought.
Then I’m in London, outside the theater, after the overnight, unable to sleep on the flight trip, plus the half hour commuter train ride from Gatwick into town and several tube stops, I’m so tired I wonder if I can stay awake through the first of nine acts, play.
Then I’m on a different sidewalk outside Proctor’s theater in Schenectady with Neil the tavern scammer, and he has a cardboard box of rare baseball cards he borrowed from a six-year-old kid playing nearby and he’s telling me we could sell the cards at Finnigan’s and split the money 50/50 which meant I would sell the cards because no one in their right mind would buy a collectible from Neil. All I had to do was keep the kid occupied long enough for the cards to be appraised but the kid runs out into the street and is hit by a car and Neil is gone. All I had to do now was get the box of cards up six floors of a brick building which meant finger climbing a vertical wall in a trash infested alley to the window where Neil was yelling down at me, “Make sure you don’t drop the cards.” And somehow, I make it most of the way up, one-handed, and Neil says, “Let me take those for safe keeping.” And then I’m in the street holding the bloody kid to my chest and the cards are ruined, strewn all around, covered in blood and a child’s scrawl in magic marker and I’m hoping that the ambulance comes in time for the first act.
Under Construction Anxiety Dream
I’m at the Busy Corner that no longer exists, window shopping at the Boston Store that got torn down years ago and I’m looking for custom, handmade t-shirts for heavy metal bands that would never come to the Utica War Memorial venue for love nor money and then I’m walking down Genessee Street looking for an address on streets that were removed during urban renewal in the 60’s to build the-around-the-city arterial and I decide to see if the red brick colossus of Genessee Street apartment building we lived in when we were first married is still there. And it is, in all its unique weird glory and I remember watching random parades for stuff that was neither a holiday nor explicable as worthy of mention in any other place in the world except for Utica, from a Juliet balcony you could step out on but not with your full weight on unless you were feeling suicidal. And I remember how living there was like being on set of Rosemary’s Baby with your pregnant wife wondering how they rippled those ceilings, why there were windows facing an air shaft whose only purpose was to see how much garbage could accumulate down there before the rats took over and why walking down the loose marble tile floor felt like a trip to the gallows following a slow, creaking elevator ride to get there. Then I am outside again walking but none of the streets, houses, buildings look familiar and all the Dutch Elm trees are back and a hundred feet tall and weaving about in the gusting wind like something out of The Shining, the novel, and I feel like I escaped from something into something worse though the people I’m with on the parade float seem nice and I ask, “What is the parade for?” But no one seems to know but The Shriner who seems to be leading the procession points to a construction site where the pavement saws are dismantling the sidewalks, the streets, the open-air shopping center, where they are going to put the Under Construction signs that seem to be everywhere but nothing actually seems to be doing anything but Coming Soon. This seven foot guy in a fez says to me, “We thought you’d never get here. Hold this.” And hands me a sparking, taped-together bunch of what looks like dynamite sticks and turns to run. “Oh,” he says before he leaves, “you might need this.” and he hands me a yellow reflective vest and a hard hat. Says something about ducking and covering but I am way beyond ducking and covering now.
This morning is weary, exhausted by squatting on the platform of waiting.
In vain it searches for the secret of absence, and rummages in the ambiguity of words, asking the letters: Who assassinates the glimmer of longing, Who tears the bond of promise from the calendar of the exciting night? For the evening is now weary, No stars, No moon, No love, No dreams! Everyone gasps for breath in the void, And the void follows the void, Grabbing its jaws wide, Devouring hopes and joy! The question remains tormented, Lamenting at the end of the question: Does love rust? And how do the flowers of reunion die?! And why does distance sprout leaves On the branches of absence? Nothing is clear here, Except my crucified question, In the pain of lips: (Whyyyyyyyyyyyy)??!!
Poet/ Aisha Al-Maharabi Aden City Republic of Yemen Bachelor of Philosophy, University of Aden Married and a mother Worked in the field of teaching Participated in several Arab festivals in Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, and Jordan Hobbies: Reading and writing in the field of poetry and literature My works have been published in several Arab and foreign newspapers, and I have had several press and radio interviews. – My poetry collection, “Master of the Evening,” was published in 2013 by the University Publishing House, Yemen. – “And the Daisy Breathed” was published in 2014 by Khalid Ibn Al-Walid Publishing House. – “How to Tame Longing” was published in 2014 by Al-Jeel Al-Jadeed Publishing House. – “Stuck Behind the Eyelids of the Homeland” was published in 2017 by Fikra Publishing House. – “Peace Be Upon You, Dawn” was published by Abrar Publishing House in 2019. – “And Madness Has Its Meaning” was published by the Poets on the Window of the World Foundation for Culture and Creativity in 2023.
