Speech development in a 19 month old

[karen99]

Hi, I hope you can give me some advice. I know all children develop at different rates and my ds appears to be 'saying' similar things to his friends, so I'm not hugely concerned, but at the same time I'm not sure if I'm doing things right!

Ds is 19mo this week. He started trying to 'talk' properly from around 15/16mo, after having baby-signed since 10mo. He says a few words clearly, eg.bear, more, door, ball (~10 words) and a few more similar to what they should be, eg.blue="boo", moon="moomoon", cracker="kak-ker", and to my embarrassment butter="bugga" (~15-20 words), and many which are just the start of a word eg. Grandad="da", red="reh", Brad="Ba" (~15 words). Finally he says a different word to the actual word, eg. down="now", toby="debal" (?!), raisin="meenon" (?!) etc. He usually tries to say new words every day. He also has a tongue tie, which might explain some of the problems, but surely not things like "meenon"!

So my questions are:

1. Is this normal development? Should he be saying more correctly by now?
2. Usually if he says something similar to what he's trying to say I naturally get excited and praise him and say "almost.. try again" and he says the same almost-word again. He then decides that's what it's being called and doesn't try to correct it. Should I accept this incorrect pronunciation or should I push for it to be more exact?
3. How do you get them to evolve from a part word, eg. "Ba" to the full word "Brad"? as he knows I recognise what he's talking about with the wrong sound and doesn't make the effort to change it.. Should I all of a sudden not understand him (which could lead to frustration/tantrum)?
4. With complete incorrect word pronunciation, how do you get them to let go of the word they've used for it for so long?
5. Shall I carry on praising after any/all attempts or pronunciation?

Any advice would be much appreciated!

ermmmm ... Yes to 1, 2, and 5
4 -don't know I think they just click and 3 Brad as in Pitt?

He sounds like he's doing really well, I wouldn't worry

1. Yes perfectly normal - not at all - he says more than my DS did at 23 months!

2. I was told the best way to combat that was if they said (for example) kakker - you just say oh yes it's a CRACKER - but only the once each time they say it. So you're not actually saying that what they said was 'wrong' but just repeating (ONCE) the correct prounciation. It's amazing how they 'suddenly' start sayihng thing correctly.

3. Similar to no.2 - just repeat the word he's 'trying' to say and give him what he wants. He'll pick it up eventually.

4. You don't - it just 'happens'.

5. Absolutely

from Gwen who's DS1 had 8 words all starting 'da', 'ma' and 'ba' when he was 23 months - but was putting short sentences together at 25 months!

Unfortunately not Pitt (but if he was a dd then most likely ).... Brad as in his sort-of uncle (my sister's boyfriend)

Thanks for the comments (and I luuurvve your brownies!)

sorry gwenick - posts crossed!

yes, I do repeat the word correctly afterwards.. unfortunately his dad thinks they're sooo cute he says moomoon too...

Don't worry about daddy saying the wrong thing too - they still pick it up.

Don't correct a child. Say "yes that's right ....." and model the correct pronouciation. 19 months is faaaaarrr too young to be worry about a speech problem. If language development is fine (and it is) then you don't need to worry about speech at all.

Hi jimjams. Yes, that's pretty much what I do at the moment. Sometimes I say "...almost..", but always show lots of smiles and "well dones".

As usual someone else put the seed in my head that things weren't as they should be! Will def listen to you guys though

[Hope all is ok at home jimjams.. saw the new arrival post! ]

All ok thanks- just tiring! I should be in bed now reallly!

Don't listen to others! Ds2 didn't say anything really util he was 2- I wasn't worried as obviously I''ve seen autism and language problems and knew his language and general communication was fine. I did think he had a speech disorder thogh. At 2 and half he was diagnosed with a speech disorder - and then he started talking properly 2 weeks later. Now at 3 (today!) his spoeech etc was recently assesed as age appropriuate and I often get comments on how good his vocabulary is!

Your ds sounds fine to me. He's also making the "correct" mistakes in his pronounciation (things like missing the end off and also repeating sounds- moomoon foor example- that's the correct mistake to make). I'm also impressed he can say "k" Ds2 still can't- and the SALT told me not to even bother working on that yet as it often doesn't come until well after 3. I only know all this because ds2 didn't make the correct mistakes - his sounds were described as "all over the place" although he still goot there in the end!

ds2's speech is obviously better than my typing!