One syllable words at 21 months

[LindsayS79]

Hi all
I'm getting worried about my DD's speech at 21months...
She understands most of what I say but doesn't seem to be adding a lot of words to her vocabulary recently. I think she's on about 15-20 words that I can understand. They are all one syllable, so instead of mummy it's 'ma' and cat is shortened to 'ca' etc. She has a lisp when saying 'yes' and 'shoes'
She babbles a lot but I'm not hearing any new clear words emerging. Should I be worried? My HV didn't seem concerned a couple of months ago but I don't think there's been a lot of progress since then

I recently posted the following reply re 16 month old speech. I don't think you should worry, and as long as she understands and responds that is probably the main thing.

QUESTIONS : Is she happy? Does she play with dolls, teddy bricks?

Herewith my other reply:
Oh Dear!! You poor mothers; why do you have to think you are "doing something wrong"? And she HAS NOT "fallen behind"!

It sounds to me you are doing everything PERFECTLY! Only babies don't read the developmental instruction book, so they don't do things when people want them to!

Our DS didn't walk at that age. There are NO hard and fast rules on when things happen, only broad generalisations on ROUGHLY what the AVERAGE baby will do at certain stages. I don't know what the 'leeway' on these things is (though I could probably find out, if you wanted me to.)

Just relax, and enjoy every moment of your time with her, (and it sounds like you do), and every little step in her progress. I wrote a 'diary' of DS progress,

Does she have access to paper and crayons, so she can 'mark make'? Sand, water, Duplo bricks to learn colours, counting, building towers - and knocking down, dolls and teddies. Keep TV and 'screens' to a minimum. Look at flowers and leaves emerging, listen to birds singing, and enjoy the sun shining.

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If you can answer my queries, I'll look back sometime and see how you are getting on.

OP - I was worried about the same thing. I saw Fergusons reply as below and chilled out. Thanks ferguson

Thanks! She's very clever and loves playing with puzzles and bricks etc. She plays with her dolls for long periods and also pretends she's on the phone a lot - babbles away!
I'm always up the park with her to see the ducks/squirrels/dogs etc and I don't stop talking away to her. That's why I get a bit worried as I would hope she would be saying a bit more by now..

I've just had my DS's 22 month review today. They've told me he is behind on his speech - this didn't surprise me. We have about 15 one syllable words that are used very sparingly.

The HV didn't seem too concerned and has said she would like to review him again in 4 months before referring him to speech therapy.

She gave me the advice of using very simple terms when talking to him so instead of saying "Look at the car on the road" I should just say "car, road".

We have been doing some of this but I'm definitely going to make more of an effort. She also asked me to keep a diary for his progress/new words/changes.

Relax about it. You're doing everything right, although do give her the opportunity to talk back at you!

She's still young so don't worry too much but do keep an eye on it. I was concerned about my DS at this age but the health visitor wasn't concerned, especially as his understanding was good. He also missed the ends of words and said very few words compared to my older child who had talked 'early'. The fact that she understands well is the most important thing and yes you are definitely doing all the right things.
He did end up needing speech therapy and because waiting lists are long and services are sparse it took us a while to get started and I wished I gone earlier and kept on at the hv. He is doing brilliantly now. Sometimes even when you are doing all the right things, they still need a little help but they all get there in the end.
gothicrainbow has some good advice about keeping it simple, also spend time looking at each other when talking so she can see they shape your mouth is making ( and you hers).

Hi, I recently posted on another thread with some suggestions I found useful when my DD was a bit slow to start talking. I pulled them from a few books and other resources.

As I said on that thread, I think some people instinctively do these things, but I didn't: but when I started doing them consciously, her speech improved very quickly.

thread here