How clear is your 2year old's speech? (+any parents of late talkers advice also welcome please!)

[brightonbleach]

hi all, just wondering as my DS is 25m and something of a late bloomer with his speech. Can your 2year old make him/her self understood? Am I worrying too much?? He has alot of single words, is quite unusual in that he won't learn anyone's name or say I want or I like... but can name most of the colours correctly and count 1-10 - but I wouldn't say that most strangers could understand alot of the words he's saying apart from the colours and numbers maybe (or even other family members, as they now seem to ask on the phone 'is DS speaking yet?' arrrrgh, very helpful when he's pointing and shouting 'wow, look, car brum brum' but they hear "wow oooo wow gar mmmm" and assume its nonsense!). he misses the ends of loads of words, he has no sentences yet, but some 2-word phrases but ('all gone', 'over dere,'ni-ni then', that kind of thing) and learns songs with the right tune and 1-2 words (the wheels on the " "bu" go roun roun roun, roun roun roun, roun roun roun", "row row row, boat(bo)") . He plays really well and has always been very physical, and does things in his own fashion so far. any reassurance/people in the same 'bo'/life stories/SALTS or anything at all welcomed please........ thanks lovely MNers :) in advance.

I'm not a SALT or anything but as a parent I'd say he sounds ok. He seems to have quite a lot of words and colours and numbers are great. My ds had a very small handful of words at 2 and nobody was worried at all. His sister could talk the hind legs off a donkey at the same age . I assume you will ahve access to the 2-3 year developmental check soon anyway so you can discuss any worries then.

thats true - we're about to move so have held off from booking his 2year check here, will do it as soon as we get to the next area. I am not overly worried, just mildly, you know how it is with mothers.............! He can certainly communicate everything he wants with me...! you see such a wide variety of little 'uns at toddler groups and so on don't you... hard not to compare.

My 22 month old says a lot of things, but it's only when my DH is around that I realise his speech isn't clear. I'm a SAHM so I'm an expert in DS's language - anyone else needs an interpreter. Your DS honestly sounds like he's doing just fine.

he sounds okay if he has lots of words and combing them together, its just that he is not that clear but atleast he has the words. take him for his check im sure they wont be too worried?
i have a ds who is 2 later this month he hardly talks at all, as in probs under 10 words, not clear, doesnt combine them together he just points and shrieks normally if he wants something. ds1 at that age was talking very clearly and saying a lot, there is a big range of how much they talk at that age.
sometimes they might check hearing for you incase that makes a difference re. how clearly he talks?

he sounds very like my DD, who is 27 mo. she uses many single words, often gets the start or the end wrong ( mum on - come on, ack ooh - thank you) but manages to make herself understood at home and at nursery.she was referred to SALT at 22mo, and we are going for a second assessment in a few weeks- we were told at 2 she ahd an expressive speech delay. her understanding is excellent so fortunately, we have no worries there.
she has numbers to 5, most colours and is making progress, but it is slow,and it is hard not to compare her to our older DD or her friends, who are very verbal.

he sounds just like my DS who will be 2 in a month or so. He has many words and can make himself understood with things like 'no' 'yeah' 'down' 'up' 'bye' but lots of other stuff is a bit garbled, also misses off the end sound often.

He is getting into numbers and colours / shapes at the moment too, definitely making progress -albeit slower than my DD who was saying thinks like 'I have drink peees mummy' at that age! :)

He sounds ok to me, but at his developmental check it might be worth asking the HV about a SALT referral anyway - it can take 6 months to be seen, and by then if it turns out you don't need it then no problem, but if you do need it then it won't be another 6 month wait.

My ds is 2.8 and doesn't sound much further on than your ds brightonbleach. Unfortunately at his 2 yr check he wasn't very cooperative (he was VERY tired and ratty) so she couldn't assess him properly. I always worry about his speech as he is a finger sucker and i do need to translate for some people as they have no clue what he is saying. He doesn't know numbers or colours though (apart from red). When you say they know numbers do you mean they recognise them written down or can count them?

my DD can count the numbers, nowhere near recognising the written number. She realised it was to her advantage, i think,as she gets more treats........

At 24 months my DS hardly said anything apart from Mummy and Daddy and his sisters name. He wouldn't even try to sound out words (although new every animal noise under the sun).
By 2.5yo there was no shutting him up. It was amazing how many words he picked up in such a short time. He's now 2y8m and speaking in sentences. Although he does miss a lot of the fronts of words IYSWIM still ('wimming pool', 'istmas tree' etc).

olivio we have tried counting with him just 1-5 but every number is 3 or 4 even when he is counting his toys he says '3 4 3 4 3 3' then looks very pleased with himself. He does talk a lot though and i understand most of what he says, he just isn't very clear. We do read a lot to him aswell.

hahah kelloo my DS goes 24385 yay!

thanks everyone for your replies! :) comforting and helpful all in one.

ritamortgan will ask at that check for possible referral, cheers
kelloo1 he can do both strangely enough, he counts from 1 to 10 spontaneously (although he misses out 2!) if he's reading a book and there is a row of, say, teddies, or on TV if they are counting on Show me show me or similar he will count along with them, if you show him the number written down (in a counting book say) he will say the right number for each one that you point to, and he held up a brick yesterday with number 1 on it and said "one!" so I would say that he can recognise them too. Pronouciation is: one, freee, bour, bive, ix, yeven, eight, nine, ten :)

I would say his understanding is way ahead of his expressing, although, bless him, he's really trying to put it all together, more vocal in the past month than ever before, doesn't stop making noise! - he just put a yellow brick out the window and shouted "bye bye yew-ow!" so maybe I should just enjoy him and stop worrying. thanks y'all

Yes, their understanding is usually well beyond their power of expressing themselves - it's a bit like being in a foreign country where you can understand the language well enough to know what's being said to you but not be able to make yourself understood. They're not expected to be intelligible to strangers until they're three or so, so if your ds is only 25 months he's got plenty of time!

My dd is 27 months. At 24 months she had 30 words and wasn't putting two together. She has had salt. She now has about 100 words she will but two together and sometimes three but prefers using single words. She has only started using other peoples names (outside family) in last month. People outside family who don't know her struggle to understand her, she isn't very clear except on basic words. She also makes up random words for things and still uses animal sounds rather than their proper names

My DS2 is 26m and sounds like he is at exactly the same stage as yours, OP, so I have found this thread reassuring too!