So when does odd pronounciation become an ishoo..?

[Mij]

Dd1, 4yr 3mths, starting school in January. Always been very chatty, articulate, large vocabulary, but needed a translator for those not 'tuned in', well into her 3s. I figured she'd just sort it out in her own time.

But now I'm wondering, as there are certain sounds she just isn't getting, and some bits of grammar she just doesn't seem to want to assimilate, and next to her peers (some with smaller vocab) she is still sometimes hard to understand.

Particularly "ch" sounds, so chilly comes out as silly for example. Ls are often missed, turned into w or just mangled. She'll still say I rather than I'm or I've sometimes. And no amount of repeating the correct version back to her seems to make any difference.

Being a very, ahem, strong minded child who doesn't like to be told how to do anything, I've left her to do her own thing, and I'm no worried about it as such, but I am wondering how teachers will react. She's also very small for her age which can lead to people underestimating her, which she finds intensely frustrating.

Any experience?

Could be an auditory processing ishoo?

Hi, it's tricky at this age isn't it, as you don't want to be picking them up on it constantly, but as they enter school intelligibility becomes more important.

My ds1 sounds quite similar to your dd. He's 4:6 and will start school in Jan. Whilst his indiviual language skills- vocabulary, grammar etc- are good, he often expresses himself in convoluted ways, not helped by a pronounced lisp (ch is ok for him- but s, z and sh are all 'wet' sounding) It can take adults quite some time to tune into him.

Not sure what to advise though.. Ch and L can be among later developing sounds and may well resolve soon. Maybe leave seeking an SLT referral til you've got the opinion of a teacher at school? That's my plan for the moment anyway!

I would mention your concerns to the class teacher when your dd starts school (I always think that if they know you are aware of any issues, it eases lines of communication, iyswim).

Once she has settled in to school, ask for a meeting with her/him to discuss it. If the situation has not started to improve, ask for a referral to slt for an assessment.

As a pp has said many of these sounds do develop later and could still come of their own accord but as she can be difficult to understand, I would want to be on any waiting list for some advice/therapy sooner rather than later.

I'm an slt btw.

Can you understand your DD all the time? most of the time? some of the time? not much?

That was the key question our HV asked when I talked to her about my concerns with 4 yr old DS's speech. When I answered "some of the time, most days we will have 1 or 2 incidents when I do not know what he is saying and have to run down a list of possibles " Then she refered us to SALT for assessment. Have now started a program of home work to help DS learn to say the dozen sounds he can't say .

I appears it is easier to get a referral done if its parents and health visitor and a not yet at school child, than if one waits for school to pick it up.

Wow, there's a lot in there to work through, thanks everyone.

LadyintheRadiator that's an interesting list, so it could just be that she hasn't got to her 'ch' sound yet, and that's within the range of normal for 4..?

FattyArbuckel I don't know enough about auditory processing. I have a major problem with new words, totally shite at languages, I just can't 'hear' them to break them down and remember them. Was once thought dyslexic but was found to be too borderline to be statemented. Is this similar?

DaftApeth thanks for your professional input, as it could be one of those things she just 'gets' overnight (I swear they download new software in the early hours) I supposed I wasn't planning on doing anything formal until someone else mentioned it. No-one, not the childminder she's been with since 12mths or the nursery she's been at since 2.5 have ever said anything.

UniS that's also an interesting scale - I can understand her almost all of the time, but I do still have to clarify for others sometimes.

cat64 I do see your point about waiting lists, but then again I'm wary of formalising something into a 'problem' that might easily sort itself out.

I think I need to spend a couple of days really noticing what sounds she has proper problems with, because it's only the 'ch' that really causes intelligibility problems because there are so many 'ch' words that turn neatly into 's' or 'sh' words and so totally change the meaning of the sentence. The word she really tortures is children. It's like there's a double s and a w somewhere near the beginning!

Anyway, I'm going to go away and do my pronunciation homework and come back to you.

Thanks again!

DS1 has just turned 3 but is starting school in a year (at 4 and 4 days!). His pronunciation very hard to understand.

Journey so far may indicate something of what MAY lie ahead for you. SENCO at nursery was sufficiently worried to refer him for a SOGS test, which HV did and confirmed no autistic spectrum problems. That took a month and a half to arrange. Hearing test at the hospital took two months to organise after a month's nagging GP-in the end HV done- and was inconclusive (glue ear, but he had a cold). GP generally needs evidence of six ear infections in a year before an automatic referral. SLT was easier, HV arranged an appointment in three weeks, with a follow up two and a half months later resulting in a referral, although as yet no NHS therapy. Even so we begged grandparents for money for a private speech assessment as his birthday present, which enabled us to have support in pushing for a further hearing test and intervention. His speech gets more and more complex-causation and multiple time clauses abounding, but no more comprehensible, in fact less so because he is saying much less context defined things. One of the things we have learned is that speedy action is important-in his case there seems agreement that his hearing is poor, but his memory excellent, so he is filing words wrongly-something which is very hard to overcome.

Sorry about all this but I hope the timings will be of help to you, and give you some sense of how long things might drag on for before anyone has even decided if there is a problem. My advice really is (a) get going speedily-the worst that can hapen is you get halfway through a prcess and the problem resolves itself; (b) use any external agencies possible to negotiate with ENT and SLT-Health Visitors, Nurseries, private assessments if you can (c) in the meantime record anything that might be relevent-in particular infections, any signs of temporary problems hearing-standing near the TV etc, problems chewing so you have a record to show-professionals not too pelased by 'a lot' as an answer (D) don't worry about the 'problem'. DS1 views interventions as a treat, not a threat. Indeed he is 'ex-cite-cite' when they happen.

Helicopter parent form hell signing off.

Right.

In comparison with others' problems I think what we have here is very minor! She's really got the vast majority of sounds or at least close enough to be well understood most of the time.

I listened to her saying children and it's something like shwiwdwen. She's got the classic w for r thing: weally for really, vewy instead of very etc etc. Some Ls she struggles with, but she can say Angelina Ballerina with the L almost sounding right.

She also has some weird accent things going on (harking back to the auditory processing thing). DP is a midlander, I'm a southerner who's lived up north for over a decade and my vowel sounds wander around, and she spends time with some locals but a lot of incomers from all over the shop. She says 'girls' like 'gels' - not Twins at St Clares style but awight Eastenders, with half an L sound and half a W. And she did this before she watching Mary Poppins with Dick Van Dyke murdering a Cockney accent!

Oh I dunno. Going to try to talk to nursery about all things related to moving on, so will see if they've even noticed. I'm generally not prone to seeing problems when kids are just taking their own time to develop, but it's just become really noticeable that her pronounciation isn't as good as her friends' in the last 6 months or so, and with school looming and a whole load of new people who aren't used to her, I didn't want to be over-casual.

Mij,

So glad that your daughter is, to someone who works with Yr1 pupils, pretty typical speechwise and, above all, which doesn't cause HER distress because she isn't understood.

I really would urge you to talk to nursery, though, and to your GP and anyone else. The early 'tests' needn't pathologise, they're simply a series of games, no more serious really than a GP visit of HV check-up. Only one intervention is deemed necessary do they need more careful handling (our DS views them as treats, not least because he gets one parent to himself and usually a grandparent visit to help with childcare). And dropping out isn't uncommon, our SaLT form even said 'if this has sorted itself out, don't reply' (or words to that effect).

But there is a huge timelag at a critical time (DS1 basically spent over a fifth of his life waiting to see if there was a problem, including admin messups losing his reports and referrals) and in your case if this does cause difficulty it will be most of your daughter's first year at school. If remotely worried I really would suggest starting balls rolling swiftly, as DaftApeth and UniS also hint.

Yes I will talk to nursery. They are extraordinarily bad at any kind of feedback, but I forgive them because they're extraordinarily good at almost everything else. Run by a team of invincible grannies and former hippies, totally child led, small and delightful and bonkers, but literally the only feedback I've had in almost two years was last week when DD1 fell out of a tree (it was inevitable - she spends 50% of her time up tall wobbly things) and when she was 'the best walker' on a nursery trip. I feel justified in asking for a bit of a chat!