4yo DS - speech and pronunciation

[dietcokeandwine]

DS2 turned 4 back in the autumn, starts school this coming September. He is very confident, sociable and articulate, and most of his speech is very clear and easily understood. However, he is still pronouncing various words in quite a babyish manner (i.e. 'dat' and 'dis' for 'that' and 'this') and has his own take on some other words (for example, 'laspberry' for 'raspberry'; he is an Abney and Teal fan, but always pronounces 'Abney' as 'Avney' and 'Neep' as 'Meep').

Is this something he's likely to just grow out of as he gets older, or might there come a point where he'd require speech therapy?

My son started school thus sept. He has articulation disorder and 6 months ago he speech was very unintelligible to anyone outside the family.
I help out in my sons class and many of the children have difficulty with the th sound, it's typically mastered at around by about 7 years. It sounds like your DS is doing fine but do keep an eye on it and ask for a second opinion if you are still worried (if he goes to nursery or maybe a health visitor).

Lots of children have these quirks in their pronunciation. What matters is that they can make the sounds they are skipping in other words.

If he can't make certain sounds he will probably still sort it out himself but it's worth asking for a referral to a Speech and Language Therapist to make sure there isn't something he needs help with.

In my experience, children start to make the effort to pronounce things more carefully once their peers start noticing their mispronunciations at school.

First 2 examples fine.
Next 2 nearly fine.
Unlikely to have major issues but get him referred as frequently waiting long lists. May need no/little input but worth checking. Also will prob get referred for a hearing test to ensure he hears all sound frequencies, worth having as won't get as standard.
Can refer self if get hold of local dept or via HV/GP

Both my kids were sort of late talkers and my son's pronunciation was quite an issue for me when he started reception. I think schools tend to handle this well. Teachers tend to be very understanding of the fact that between 4-5, there will be a 'speech' spectrum among their pupils. Some kids will speak the Queen's English, others will have a varying degree of delays and difficulties. If there is a real issue, teachers will flag this and sometimes it's much easier once your DS is at school and assessed by staff to be referred quickly and effectively. Also, most schools have on-site help with such issues. In my own experience, it all rights itself. I would recommend a hearing test. My son's hearing was fine and his speech, though slow, did improve by the middle of reception (he was quite behind in nursery). He is now 12 and his teachers always comment on how articulate he is. Go figure! My daughter failed her hearing test and was found to have been suffering from glue ear. This really slowed down her speech development for several months. But the glue ear cleared after a few months and with a couple of sessions of speech therapy, she came back to her old self. GPs usually refer for hearing first, speech second if hearing results flags any issues, even minor ones.

My son will also start school this Sep and sounds like yours.

DS is 4 in May so will be one of the younger ones but we were really conscious of his "baby" talk so we had him referred for speech therapy. Health visitor was relucant and said he was 'border line' but he also dribbles more than you'd expect a 3 year old too so we were quite concered.

DH took him to the group session where the children were all the same age and the speech therapist asked why on earth our DS had been referred!!

Apparently its very normal and not a concern at all, its common in boys.

Our daughter was fully and clearly talking at 2 so you cant help but compare!

We were told to buy him toys that use mouth muscles, we got a recorder. Noisy mistake! but it may help.