Pronoun reversal at 2.5

[Babymad1234]

How common is pronoun reversal at 2.5 , specifically you and I . She has a lot of spontaneous conversations and answers to a lot of questions but she doesn’t get you and I correct no matter how I correct her . She has some set phrases like “ I don’t want “ I got “ I have etc .
the reason I ask is because this particular pronoun mix up with you and I is not that common in a normal language acquisition process

Hears!*

Whoever is telling you that a simple grammatical mistake is a sign of autism, does not know what they are talking about.

I am a qualified nursery worker, and this sort of language confusion is very common, because our language is complex to learn.
Don’t worry.

Ah my nearly 5yo says this too and I've never heard anyone else use this. I find it pretty cute but did worry if she was getting a bit big for it!

I agree. You can see through their mistakes how they’re learning the rules. Eg my 3 year old says “mine’s” as in “that book is mine’s” because she’s learnt that when something belongs to someone, you add an ‘s’ (“that book is mummy’s”). Obviously the rule doesn’t apply to “mine”, but you can see through the mistake she makes how she’s learning.

It’s the same for your DD, OP. She’s making a mistake, but you can see where she’s learning, how she’s listening to you, what she’s picking up on.

Don’t correct her. Model the correct language, repeat things back in the correct way. But mostly, just talk to her normally and frequently.

Thank you for your words and also for your expertise

WHO is telling you this, exactly? What sort of idiot goes around telling parents of 2.5 year olds that their child could be autistic just because their don’t have perfect grammar? No 2.5 year old has perfect grammar!

You and I are as difficult a concept as “yours” and “mine” and I found the latter really hard to teach and my DS took a while to get it. He did just naturally get it after a few months.

I think it’s totally normal - don’t worry. I’m just thinking back and remembering that I used to refer to myself a lot in the third person, I think to avoid the confusion and I’m sure I read that using “I” confuses young children - so I’d often say “shall mummy help you?” or “now it’s mummy’s turn” or whatever. It’s a hard habit to break and occasionally I do it now still 🤣

I’m not an expert on autism although have taught several children diagnosed with autism, and i do think there is such a wide variety of possible autistic traits that are also young children traits, especially at toddler age!

Not another thread about pronouns

One of my DDs did this too, and for quite a while, but grew out of it naturally by the time she started school. I don’t remember anyone commenting on it particularly and she’s not autistic (in her 20s now).

On the other hand, my autistic DD was very accurate and precise with pronouns (and grammar generally) right from when she started to talk.

Who is giving you this information?

As you can see from these posts, this is normal for her age. Please stop correcting her, it'll disappear soon enough so enjoy the cuteness while it lasts!

This would be true in much older children though. I would not be concerned at 2.5. At 3.5 I would want to monitor it and by 4.5/5, it could form part of a bigger picture that could suggests autism. But it’s a natural stage of language acquisition that is perfectly normal at 2.5.

It sounds like she may be a gestalt language processor, I would look into this. Nothing to worry about as it’s just a different way of learning language.

As others have said, it’s entirely normal. That’s why parents commonly, without even really thinking about it use ‘motherese’ with toddlers - referring to their child by name and themself as mummy or daddy.

This is one of the few cases where it’s hard to model correctly because the ‘you’ and ‘I’ swap. Unless maybe you’ve another person so the child can observe you addressing each other.

It’s really really common, I see it a lot in my job (speech therapy). It is quite a confusing situation really as you will say ‘I’m giving you the toy’ and they think that they are ‘you’ and you are ‘I’ because that’s what you said.
You can try using names instead. ‘Mummy is giving the toy to you’, ‘I’m giving the toy to Sarah’.
And just modelling the correct information also will help. But she’s very young.
it ‘can’ be a sign of something like autism. But not on its own, and definitely not at 2.5.

Yes, my son is now eight and has to remind me to stop because it’s “total cringe” ha ha.

@Babymad1234 have you tried speaking in this way?
So you say “Can Clara give the shoes to Mummy?” Instead of “Can you give the shoes to me?

or “Mummy is taking Clara to the park today”.

Basically always talk in the third person.

It CAN be a sign of autism but that would be at an older age and with various other traits - social communication deficits, restrictive and repetitive behaviours and speech and language difficulties. My almost 7yo DD has an ASD diagnosis and regularly still mixes up pronouns (among many other speech issues.)

My 3.5 yo DD who is NT has much more articulate speech than eldest DD and doesn’t mix up pronouns now but certainly would have a year ago - this is absolutely a normal part of speech development and unless you have various other concerns is not an issue.

I’m an autism specialist and it isn’t a trait of autism.

My DC went from “My do it” about getting dressed and putting shoes on to, “I am doing it by myself” quite quickly, with no correction. “My do it” was much cuter.

Yes this is what we always did - I think it makes much more sense to a child as the 'labels' stay the same rather than changing depending on who's speaking or hearing the same label apply to different people.

I did enquire about gestalt and was told that because she can answer open ended questions like why’s , what did you do etc appropriately she can’t be

Oh it's you again......
You have been told time and time again your chold appears to be developing normally.

Oh it's you again......
You have been told time and time again your chold appears to be developing normally.