How many non verbal children did you know growing up? How many do you know now?

[MaryMaryVeryContrary]

Not a goady thread and I wont be engaging with posters who want to speculate on the causes by starting debates about parenting and screen time.

But in the absence of any proper data, I’m interested to know whether others think there has been a rise in non verbal children (age 3 and over). I didn’t know any growing up, and now I know 3. So it seems to me there has been a rise but it may just be the area I live in.

It would be interesting to know the statistics on whether there's been an increase in numbers, or just in awareness.

In the 60s children with asthma, deafness, blindness and other physical disabilities were in special schools, presumably non-verbal children were too.

In primary school there was only one child with a visible disability, who wore a leg caliper brace after contracting polio.

None and one

@TigerRag

I knew a non verbal child who was in the same mainstream school as myself

Right, but the vast majority, certainly 40 years ago, would not have seen a mainstream primary school.

None, I know one now, my friend's DS. I think they were more kept 'out of sight'. Whereas we don't do that anymore. We integrate more.

i didn't know any growing up but a few now. However, both DC have disabilities so we have a lot of links to the disability communities. My severely disabled child has a rare chromo disorder. I read once that many scientists believe these are more common now (environmental factors such as pollution). DC's special school says the co-hort has completely changed in the last 10-20 years and that there are a lot more severely disabled children. Nothing to do with better diagnosis - these are severity brackets which wouldn't have flown under the radar. Even many moons ago.

Well a lot when I was at primary in the 80s as our school was next to a home for the 'mentally subnormal' . They were just sadly hidden from mainstream life.

Now I don't know any non verbal children .

Growing up- 0
6 years ago in my mainstream school- 1
Now in my mainstream school- well over a dozen

@Perzival not to be picky, but if the person communicates using AAC (as my DS does) then they are not non-verbal. It is not the same thing. My DS will also "talk the hind leg off a donkey", he just doesn't do it using his mouth. He would not be happy with being referred to as non-verbal.

None and none.

However, I grew up in the 60s, when children with additional needs were routinely placed in special schools, often residential, and so there was little contact with children with issues like this.

None of my friends or family had children with additional needs, either.

None, but that was the 60s and they’d have been in special school. One now, severely autistic, and he probably would have been in a special residential school when I was young.

He is in a special unit in mainstream school now. Don’t know if that’s what you mean?

One growing up who was my deaf friend and one now who is my brothers best friends daughter who has ASD.

None and none

I can remember being able to talk and having friends that couldn't talk yet. Also being asked to speak in simpler sentences so other kids could understand. We'd all have been about 3 I suppose.
I had a friend that was partially deaf who took a long time to start talking.
So.....one or two from childhood..

From my kids childhood....One of mine was a bit delayed and was talking in two word sentences at 3 years old.
I know a few others like that. Either simpler language than you'd expect. Or speech that isn't clear to people who don't know them well.
I sometimes see kids in the supermarket who seem to have the language skills you'd expect in much younger kids.
I know an older kid with limited speech due to learning disabilities, although he knows a lot of macaton.

Both times.....fairly poor areas. Apparently our kids are about 18 months behind the curve on average.
They get there in the end though.
I don't know any primary age non verbal kids, except where there's an obvious disability.

Have a friend who is an assistant teacher and says they are getting more kids coming in to school who aren’t toilet trained, no reason other than the parents haven’t done it.

None growing up, none now. We did have a family friend with a child who had fairly severe MH issues and eventually became non-verbal and unable to care for themselves in adulthood. But that child was relatively "normal" during childhood and was able read, write and speak throughout school.

Depends on your definition of non-verbal, I suppose. If you mean elective mutism then I didn't know any then or now. I'm guessing because as adults we have to speak or what's the alternative?
If you mean non-verbal due to a disability then I knew none as a kid growing up- I went to a mainstream school, and there were kids who were struggling but they were in a group with an SEN teacher but they could all speak.
My friend has a severely disabled sister so I know of one now. And non-verbal doesn't totally describe her as she does make noises, but, unless you know her really well can't always tell what it is she's trying to communicate.

2 growing up (my brother and a child in my class at school who left mid-primary presumably to go to special school)

1 now (my brother)

In both cases I could count the many other people who are at the school/care home my brother is in but the number won't differ.

@BigDahliaFan and that is relevant how?

What's this got to do with non verbal children?? 🙄 🙄 🙄 🙄

None and then many, in my professional life.

None growing up.

Now- 2 in my wider network, both of whom are also in nappies and with low developmental ages. Both premies who probably wouldn't have survived a few years ago. Both sets of parents have split under the pressure and the women are suffering very badly with their mental health due to the strain.

@Yerroblemom1923

Depends on your definition of non-verbal, I suppose. If you mean elective mutism then I didn't know any then or now.

I'm guessing because as adults we have to speak or what's the alternative?

Goodness that's so utterly ableist. Non verbal adults exist. So do selective mute adults.

It depends how old you are, but when I was a child there wasn’t ASD. Autism was a diagnosis for mostly severely disabled children. Asperger’s syndrome was a diagnosis for the type of ASD that you get among computer programmers and only was formalised in 1994. And there were many more kids who were just “a bit odd” or had social interaction issues.

It wasn’t until 2013 that for some IMO misguided reason people in charge decided to lump together non-verbal severely delayed children with highly functional people who might even have special skills in certain fields. Combined with the expansion of diagnostic criteria it seems now that everyone has ASD and it’s becoming a meaningless diagnosis in some ways.

I also don’t think it has helped children with severe autism or their families for these various syndromes to have been conflated. There is also some very unhelpful activism online from highly functional ASD adults who say things like “we don’t need to be cured” and lobby against programmes that seek cures, when in fact the families of severely disabled children are desperate for answers, treatments, and ways to prevent this condition.

I had a sibling with special needs and knew some, plus adults.
The two adults lived at home and just didn’t go out really, so I guess it was hard to meet them.
The children were in a special school, bused in and again harder to meet. One girl was very late to talk with downs and never went to school at all, just kept at home.

By the way non verbal isn't necessarily the rest - my dsd will talk about her favourite tv characters and foods, and other random things but she doesn't answer questions at all, severely ld