Concerned about friend's 3 year old

[twiglett]

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Twiglett. My sister's son was like this at 3 and my horrible partner at the time told her to take him to a speech therapist which totally freaked her out. This was the first time they'd met.

He is now a very articulate and intelligent little boy and it just took him longer than his peers to coordinate his speech which was much clearer by the time he reached 4.

In the end, she did take him for hearing tests as he also shouted everything but he was passed "normal".

It depends on how close a relationship you have with your friend as to whether you could broach this with her. You could offend her.

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Twiglet - I think its best left alone. I know that would be mortified and hurt if a friend suggested that ds wasn't developing properly. If there is something wrong it will be highlighted when he starts Nursery. I have been told by my HV that even if a child had a suspected lisp (for example) he wouldn't go to a speech therapist until he was 5 anyway.

Does he have a dummy??? The girl across the road from me has a 5 yr old son who had just started school and no-one apart from his Mum and sister can understand him. Nothing wrong with him apart from the fact that he learned to talk with a dummy in his mouth! He's attending a speech therapist now and doing very well. Very Scary though!! DS dummy is now strictly for bedtime!

Twigett, tbh I'd leave it too unless I was asked and then I think I'd ask the friend what her concerns were before suggesting that they might be worth checking out.

Twiglet, I'm sure I don't know you but you are actually describing me........

Anyway, I have the same thing with DS2 (age 3), I have to 'translate' to everyone what he says, but he has great vocab and strings long sentences and ideas together. I took him to a drop in speech therapist last week and the conclusion is that his pick up of certain sounds is slighty immature which makes him hard to understand esp. when talking fast (favourite phrase in our house is 'just show me!' She didn't seem that bothered and we have decided to give him another 3/4 months to catch up before looking into it further. Kids develop at different rates so your friends DS will catch up in his own time!

Incidently, I was going to leave it until his 3 1/2 year check to talk to his HV until his nursery teacher mentioned it at parents evening - so someone will bring it up with your friend.

Twiglett, Unless there are other "signs", e.g. not poiting, not sharing attention, I'd leave it too. My niece was unintelligible until she was about 5!