Receptive and Expressive language delay 2.3 year old

[Sama12]

Hi all,
Has anyone experience with receptive and expressive language delay in a 2 year old? Were they able to catch up and what helped them to improve the receptive language? Toddler is super active, not very good attention, which seems to make it harder to process and learn new words.

Also how can these toddlers be helped to have less meltdowns/tantrums due to lack of understanding?

Thanks for any advice and tips.

My DS had/had this, its been slow painstaking work with fortnightly speech therapy and 1-1 support at nursery for a couple of years to help him make progress.

The website teachmetotalk has some good videos/podcasts on teaching receptive language, Mr Tumble/Makaton signing was helpful in the early days and also to show me where he was on his way to speech (there is a checklist on there of pre-verbal stages).

At 2.3 my DS was angry that he couldn't communicate, but at 2.4 after two sessions of specialist speech therapy he pointed to show interest :-) He had his first words around 3.

You could start with makaton signing.

sorry, i meant the teachmetotalk website has the checklist. Makaton helped him start to communicate his requests e.g juice/biscuit.

Also, receptive language delay is a red flag for autism, but it isn't always autism.

Thank you very much! I will look into it.

At 2.3 years old receptive delays can be a little concerning, expressive not so much. When you say that he has a receptive language delay, is he able to follow any simple commands like for example close the door, give me your shoes (is he is holding them), take your jacket off, "where is X?" questions, etc? how does he communicate with you? when he wants something or when he wants to share his enjoyment or interesting things that he sees with you?

Hello, thanks for your reply. The problem is so far I only have a private SALT assasment. Still waiting on NHS assasment. He will listen sometimes but not consistent. He seems very distracted and with short attention span. Since he was able to walk from 11 months, he was constantly on the go. He never wanted to listen to anything or read a book or play like quite games. It did improve a little bit now. He is able to play for longer or sit down a play for a bit. He will sometimes follow instructions but not always, so it’s super confusing. His hearing was checked last week. It’s fine. He interacts with me, smiles, ask for help, play with other kids. If he wants anything he will not ask mostly cry or scream or pull me to where he wants me to come or go. He will not point to body parts. He is super active, running, climbing. We will now start speech therapy. Speech therapist said he has a receptive and expressive language delay, but short attention for his age but he also has some very strong points in his communication. I have an older daughter, aged 4. So I kind of see the difference. It’s hard as I dont know what’s going on. He is very clever and otherwise reached is milestones except language.

He also shares his enjoyment with me or will basically ask for help non verbal. But he just doesn’t really listen. He can say a few words but not as much as he should olus he will not always use the words he know already in the context, he should.

Hi all,

I am in the same boat with my 2.3 year old boy. He has no words, and understands 3 words. So expressive and receptive speech delay. No copying, pointing, gesturing, no interaction with adults or peers (amazing eye contact and interaction with me and his dad). Gets st, ot, dt but no help. Happy, cuddly, smiley, excited, loves outdoors, malls, tolerates people but does not interact, sleeps and eats okay, loves letters and numbers. No proper diagnosis yet but I quit working because of him and losing hope, health, and sleep thinking of his future. He babbles ALOT but leads me by hand and somehow gets his point across. Will he ever understand language, will he ever talk, will he have a good life, will he be able to succeed in school - I will accept him with his ASD and whatever else comes with it, but I just want him to understand and talk to me. Please share your story and I hope to find some hope and comfort by talking to others in the same situation. May God help us so we can help our kiddos.
Thanks.

Hi, I’m still waiting for an assessment by a pediatrician. I totally understand you and its my biggest worry too for his future. I wish him just to talk and be able to communicate. My son is now 2.5. his receptive language has definitely improved but expressive just a bit. He currently has speech therapy weekly but the basic of attention and listening is lacking/delayed according to SALT and that’s why speech is not coming on much. Also he was assessed by an OT and definitely has sensory processing difficulties, which can interfere with his learning. Feel free to message me. I know its so worrying.

Hi ,
Can you please share your updates? We are in the same boat. Do you have any tips to improve receptive language? What worked for you?

My DS has this. Had no words at all at 2.3. He is now 6 and has made massive progress but is still noticeably behind his peers. He had autism so his SALT issues are part of his condition - so I think he'll always find it hard. Although, weirdly, I find learning to read has helped his speech and language no end.

Hi, I have a 22 month old boy and I am experiencing similar issues. He is very interactive with us when playing peek a boo, singing nursery rhymes etc. His speech is good saying all words like mama dada, up, down etc however whenever I call his name 8/10 times he ignores me! He does the same things like grabbing my hands to take me to where he wants to go or turn on a toy but from looking online not responding to their name is a concern. Haven't made any steps yet in regards to doctors, just looking for some advice and understanding from people going through similar things with their DS. Should I ring the doctors? Any advice is welcome!!

@Mumofboys2X hand leading could be more concerning than lack of name response at 22M if that is the only way that they are communicating with you. Does he point to request things that are out of reach? does he point to show you interesting things? (like a plane in the sky).

OK I hadn't seem much about that when have been looking into it. He doesn't point as such however if for example his drink is on the side he will be reaching out for him to try and get it. But to be honest he doesn't point that much at all. Finding it really hard to judge however he will have his 2 Yr check with HV in next couple of months to raise these concerns. But should I act sooner?

@Mumofboys2X
Hi, my boy is 19 months old. And I shared my concerns with our pediatrician when my boy was 17 months. We started Early Intervention evaluation. And are still waiting for services to be approved. We live in New York.
I can share what a psychologist told us. He said that not pointing to something he finds interesting is a very big concern. Even though he can point to something he wants. But he has to be able to share enjoyment. It’s okay if he is not pointing, but can share with you using some other ways. Hand leading was something he noticed first when we just started evaluation and he immediately took a note and after few days he told me that he noticed that my boy uses his intelligence to get everything he wants. But he doesn’t try to communicate. So he said he sees a communication delay, which is linked to ASD. I was so confused. But I started working with my boy. We honestly had very rough 6 months combined with lots of mastitis and the pandemic, so I was not able to do any developmental activities. I didn’t even play with him meaningfully and if I only small talked with my sweet boy. I did setup Montessori environment at home, but I forgot to guide him. So he was alone most of the time. The same psychologist said that it doesn’t matter, and a desire to communicate comes naturally to babies. But developmental pediatrician said that lack of interaction can be a cause of his delays. It’s not necessarily ASD.
He changed so much after I started playing and teaching him in a friendly environment. But I do nothing more. I even stopped taking care of myself. I work with his speech (Teach me to talk and her books are my best sources of knowledge). I try to come up with lots of play ideas to help him with fine motor skills. I speak a lot during the day, we ride a bicycle together and listen music. We spend so much time outdoors and I help him with his receptive language delay in natural environment. Like if we see a flower, I teach him how to smell it. I point a lot, especially outside. I try to be very friendly with everyone around and not stress in front of him. I ignore his bad behavior and praise good, but I give him a meaningful compliments. He almost immediately started showing such a progress.
If you can, call you doctor, but in the meantime don’t waste your time, check out teach me to talk. She has so many good podcasts, especially about pointing, receptive language delay, all skills that baby should master before they start speaking. It will help you to know more about the issue. And don’t torture yourself trying to find out if he has some developmental disorders reading articles (I did, and I lost 10 kg). Even our psychologist said that it hard to tell, because so many things can be linked with expressive- receptive language delay at this age, when babies doesn’t show some other red flags.

@NatiMark
Thank you so much for sharing for your message. After looking into it abit more me and my partner have been actively making changes and trying to interact in different ways and to our surprise just after a few days hes starting to acknowledge his name! I feel there is still a long way to go though. The pointing does worry me as I know others his age would be well ahead doing this as well as waving which he doesnt do. I relate with the stress I literally couldn't stop researching for a week straight on my phone and it was having an effect. I am in the UK and think its all different here as we don't have any early intervention and not in any rush to diagnose until after 3. I am definitely going to research that podcast and get some tips! We will see the health visitor in a couple months where I will defo raise these concerns if he's not improved.

@Mumofboys2X
Hi, hope you are doing ok. I think I am in a similar situation to you with my 22month old little girl. She says quite a few words but doesn’t point and responds to her name only sometimes. And like your son she is very interactive with nursery rhymes and playing peekaboo games. She does like to lead me to things like when she wants to go in the kitchen or upstairs. I just wondered if you have had any feedback from the HV or GP? Mine told me to wait a bit until she is 2 to see how she is, but I am feeling so helpless and feel like I need to do something if this is a concern.

@JenAm Hi. I'm good thank you hope you are to. I did end up speaking to the GP who did a consultation over the phone and I believe he completed the questionnaire and screening for autism as it was quite in depth. From what we discussed he didn't believe there was any concerns at the moment as everything else he is doing is as it should be and he even told me to wait until 2 and a half before referring back and just mentioned he is probably a late talker and its common etc. Whilst this was reassuring to some degree I still feel helpless and find myself constantly trying to stimulate him as much as I can. We made a game with his name where we would chase him which has helped ALOT with him responding. Its really hard to 'sit and wait' but I'm just trying my best not to keep googling as it has had an effect on me and some nights I've hardly slept thinking of things I can do to help him. He will be 2 in 4 weeks so hopefully the HV appointment should come through for a second opinion but we will see with all thats going on. I do think they are all different but thats all everyone keeps saying to me. I have a niece who is 2 and 5 months and she has only just started speaking in sentences. So I'm just hoping it all comes at once and he catches up. Hope this helps

@Mumofboys2X
Thanks for your reply and sorry you have been going through this worry as well. It’s so hard when you can’t sleep etc, I have been feeling the same and it awful. I will take your advice and try not to keep googling, I am terrible at that and it definitely makes the worrying worse. Glad your doctor has given you some reassurance to some degree. It is true they are all different and I think I believe that my daughter will be ok if there’s a developmental issue or not, but it’s the not knowing that’s difficult because you want to help but you can’t be sure how exactly. But anyway thanks and I do hope everything gets better for you soon.

My DS was the same, started speech therapy privately about 2 and a half (weekly for an hour for 8 months.)

Attention span very short, not even good with watching Tv, couldn't watch a movie. Slowly improved due to therapy, taking turn games, is playing together with me narrating and me talking simply to him, repeating, repeating, boring myself repeating again 😁Leaving some looooooong gaps for him to reply, even if he didn't.

It's weird after 997 times of saying look duck when passing the pond by our house, one day he says duck and points. It all goes in. One thing I would say is there is advice to say don't pressurise kids to talk, but I don't think this helps long term. Giving them options can, but it's so easy to still point( DS points to cupboard, I say "you want biscuit" ( simple sentence) I open cupboard and bring out two things. I say raisins or biscuit ( labelling items) He points .. but after a while I did say can you try to say and he tried. We had to break the pointing. When he stated to use words they weren't correct but he maybe got part of it.

Attention span here still bad and is off to school in September (age 4) Will be interesting to see what they say. Speech I'd say is 80% there now. Amazingly how it comes. There wasn't an overnight moment. It was very very slow. Confidence is the main issue now.

Plus if they are watching tv or iPad make sure it's something with vocabulary. Mr Tumbke is fine, if they are interested. There was a good short programme on words and language expansion on CBeebies Yakka Dee. So one word per programme e.g Egg but expanded big egg, white egg. But stuff like Paw patrol is fine there is dialogue that captures their imagination, those weird you tube videos with just music have no language to listen to.

Sorry I name change a lot, so if this sounds familiar from a past thread then yes it's me again.

@Aisha1123 how is your son doing now after 6+ months.... I’m in a similar situation but with my dd, she seems to be delayed in all areas, not talking no babbling, doesn’t crawl or walk and I don’t think she understands .... and that is my biggest worry her understanding... keep thinking about her future and it really gets to me constant worrying ... my dd is 15m

Hi Aisha

How is your son doing now?

Hi I would love to hear how all the children are doing since these messages were posted. My daughter is 2.3months and she is very delayed in her speech. Has about ten words but I am more concerned that her receptive language understanding is poor.

Hi @121314mum I know I’m not the main poster in this thread so I’m not sure if this will help you. A few months after I posted here, we took my dd to a paediatrician and we got an asd diagnosis for her.
We have seen some really good progress in her receptive language and verbal communication seems to be improving slowly. Do you have any other concerns for your dd or is it mainly the speech/communication?

@JenAM as you probs have gone through I have had sleepless nights allot of tears and feelings of depression. My daughters receptive language is poor and her eye contact is poor also with lack of engaging with others. I feel like an ASD diagnosis is on the horizon but i haven’t taken any steps yet to get one.

I feel lost. Nursery have yet to comment but I just know there’s something there. I want to just know what I need to do now to get her on the right path. My biggest concern is that she won’t ever communicate and be able to go to school. I know she is just 2.3 years old but I just feel very down about it all.

@121314mum I can certainly identify with these feelings. I had months of sleepless nights and went to therapy because of it. Feel free to PM me if you want to talk about it more.
Have you had the 2 year check yet? As that can bring up it there are concerns. It is really difficult conversations to have, but it will probably be good to ask nursery if they do have any concerns. But understandable if you do need to work up to that - I know I did. If you are based in the UK it’s a long diagnosis process, so it wouldn’t happen for a while. Theoretically they will get services in place on a needs basis prior to any diagnosis being made, so if your daughter were to need speech therapy, you should be able to get on the waiting list for that.
We went private for our diagnosis so it happened very quickly, if we did NHS I think we’d be looking at around age 4.
Your daughter will find a way to communicate with you whatever the outcome - if she is autistic, those children still do progress, they are just often on a different timeline to the standard milestones. Xx