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Trilingual child with speech delay

80 replies

Lize90 · 10/01/2025 12:54

Hello , i have a 4 year old who is struggling with conversations, she does understand everything and take directions , communicates with single words but doesn’t make back and forth conversations. She is involved with 3 languages as me and her father were raised in different countries. Do you have a similar experience , I’ve been to speech and language but I haven’t seen any improvement as they were trying to make her say words but she already knew that .

OP posts:
FanofLeaves · 10/01/2025 13:03

Anything she wants to say out loud she’s having to mentally process in three languages. She’s only 4, this will take some time.

Mix56 · 10/01/2025 13:01

I agree with pp. it will sort itself out.
Her first language will probably end up being the one she learns at school.

Turophilic · 10/01/2025 12:59

If her speech is fine (ie no impediment) and it’s just the amount of language, I believe that’s perfectly normal in multilingual children. Their knowledge and comprehension is split across three languages, so they are slower in all when young.

bridgetreilly · 10/01/2025 12:57

Can you step back on at least one of the languages for a bit?

Elisheva · 10/01/2025 12:56

Are you doing one parent one language?

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