significant speech & language delay in DD (3yrs; trilingual)

[littleElif]

hello,

we try to bring up DD (3) trilingual:
1)L1- mother tonge
2)L2- father tonge

3)L3- community language (english)
we practice OPOL.

DD has significant speech and language delay. can't combine words yet... also understanding behind. by far her stongest is L1. L3 (English) is by far the weakest despite attending nursery (started 2 years ago).

awaiting appointment with speech and language therapist for assessment but I am pretty sure they won't have much experience with children like DD. By the way - I am pretty sure her delay is not related to the 3 languages. I think she is just a speech delayed child that happens to grow up multilingual - I do not think that the 3 languages are the reason for her delay.

I just wonder if we should drop L1 and L2 and just focus on English - after all we like in the UK and English is essential for DD's everyday's life. But dropping L1 and L2 will rob her off her strongest languages... really confused as what do do.

has anybody here been in a similar position? what did you do?

cheers!

Can you drop her L2, and keep her MT - if this is her best language, it will hamper her development to drop it. Keep to one language at home and one at nursery?

neer ever drop any of languages
once is gone is gone :(
one parent - one language (I am sure you know the rule)
once dd is in full time education her English will come naturally

we were thinking of downgrading L2 (daddy and I speak english with each other to add to the language muddle we are in); i.e. daddy and I start speaking L1 with each other. I speak L1 to DD but daddy keeps using his langauage when communication with DD....

don't know. all really confusing. the thing is there is a problem with her language development and I am not really sure whats the best way forward... just want to help DD to speak/communicate - in whatever language...\\sz

kayah - there are children who cannot manage more than one language.

OP - may I ask what your L1 and L2 languages are?

L1 is german and L2 is turkish....

Bonsoir, I have to disagree. I believe if a child can learn one language, s/he can learn two (or more) if you start young enough. I have worked with children who have quite bad learning difficulties (brain damaged at birth) who were very delayed in almost all areas at school, but who could speak 2 languages fluently because they attended a dual language school and spent much of their time immersed in second (non community) language.

(Sorry for long complicated sentence! Hope you get what I'm trying to say.)

No I am afraid you are not correct - some language disorders/delays are very strongly hindered by the presence in the child's environment of more than one language.

Bonsoir - I hae never come across any research which says that some children can only learn one language?
have you got some links, I am very interested in finding out more.

kayah - nor have I! That's not what I am saying! The point is, if your child has a speech disorder, the additional burden of more than one language (which even the brightest children do find an extra burden) may be so great that it hinders the child from making sufficient progress in any single language to go through normal developmental stages. So, in order to maximise the chances of a speech delayed child of learning at a normal speed, you reduce the language exposure (normally to a single language).

When you live in a multi-lingual environment you see this issue arise quite often.

bonsoir - you sound as if you have some experience in this area???

I would be interested in any documented research where bi (or even tri) lingualism could contribute or even cause speech probems. Ds2 attends a speech and language therapy school and has numerous tests and not once has it ever been suggested that his bilingualism could be a factor, even if the obvious conclusion would be that exact reason. I have constantly been reassured that the 2 are not related at all. The way children learn languages is very different tohow an adult does.

My advice to the op is to find a SALT who deals with multi lingual children. If you can catch Moondog she is really experienced in these issues.

Why would it be gone forever? I thought a big part of early years polylingualism was getting the brain tuned into hearing the sounds unique to each language. By 3yo the child's brain will have that ability for life. They can pick up the language later if it's useful to them to learn it, much more easily.

Does she watch English language TV, OP? A lot of children learn English from TV.

I know a family in a similar position, the child was five years old before it was realised that she had no language good enough for formal education. They dropped one language and concentrated on the mother's language with intensive SALTand changed the child to a school where that langauge was spoken. She is doing ok now but it was a very tough year.

LittleElif - it's good that you are doing something about this now. I don;t drop whether you need to drop one language completely or simply have a lot more input from one of the languages.

We have no TV ;-)

Have you had her hearing checked?

yep - hearing is fine :)

MrsMills - multi-lingualism has not, to my knowledge, been shown to cause speech problems. However, since all multi-lingual bear a significant additional burden, a child who has a speech disorder may be prevented from acquiring sufficient working knowledge of a single language if it is asked to cope with more than one language.

I think anyone, like Belgo or me, who lives in a multi-lingual set up will have come across cases of this.

I have a relative with quite severe developmental delay who was brought up in a trilingual environment. Her parents made the decision first to move to a bilingual environment, and then to a monolingual environment, to try to help her acquire sufficient skills in one language to follow school. Alas, they did all this too late and she went right through the education system lagging severely behind and leaving school aged 18 unable to read or write.

She did, however, learn to read and write between the ages of 18 and 20, and subsequently got a Montessori assistant qualification! But what a waste of all those years of childhood, which she will largely never recover.

we are talking extreme scenarios here
is not really a scientific example but I am sure it is real and I feel sorry for her

I know many multilingual children and personally never come across such scenario.

kayah - I don't think the scenario I am describing is remotely "extreme". It is really relevant to the OP IMO.

Kayah - all children are different. I was brought up speaking just one language but was a very late speaker and needed speech therapy. Fortunately because it was dealt with early, I was fine at school.

I imagine for a child like me, the problems would be more complicated to sort out if I had been learning two or three languages. I have since learnt a second language as an adult.

Or if there was another problem such as autism, this might make it very difficult for a child to learn more then one language, and it's possible in that case, more then one language may be detrimental to the child's development.

OP I am not suggesting your dd has autism, I'm just using it as an example.

To the other extreme, I met an eight year old girl who speaks 4 languages. French to her mum; Iranian to her dad, english when they are all talking together, and flemish at school.

She is extremely bright and very talkative.

My own personal experience is that it has been an effort on my part to teach my children to speak english as flemish is the dominant language; and dd1 had a hearing problem which didn't help. Well worth the effort though.

Of course all children are different 9that's why we are asking questions on here :) )

Of course I don't know much about language development apart from I needed to learn as a parent etc, but the OP's dd is 3

we don't een know if she was diagnosed by a specialist

most children i mix language families speak bit later with fluency even in the main language that is why is apparent that they are late at that age

ultimately any parent does what's best for their child

dropping parent's languages at this stage would mean she would be unlikely eer learn it properly

Is her only problem that she can't combine words and that she doesn't have good comprehension (which varies across the 3)?
Or are there other speech problems, and difficulties making certain sounds, perhaps?

DC have mostly had language delay.
By which I mean, Late to make certain sounds, difficulty in putting words together correctly to make sense (English our only tongue).
For instance, DS (almost 3) can only manage one 3-word phrase.
Am not an expert, but I would imagine a speech delay would be consistent across different languages.

That the OP's child is inconsistent, makes me think the speech is delayed purely because of the trilingual environment, and odds are that it will come on its own, but SLOWLY. If you want to accelerate speech skills you've got to saturate with language, using TV or videos maybe, or just talking non-stop. However you do it, really ratchet up the language input/output.

I think all children are fundamentally capable of learning multiple languages but as bonsoir I think is trying to point out a child who is having problems will carry an extra burden and it may be necessary to eubstantially increase exposure to one language in order for them to be able to get things straight and enable the basic processes of language acquisition. When you start to look at linguistic theory it's fairly evident that if the basic functions of language are not acquired in at least 1 language there will never be complete understanding and communicative capability in any. Thankfully such severe delays and language disorders are very rare.

In multilingual children generally I bank on the side of speech being slightly late because there is so much information going in it's taking a long time to process but that's not usually a very significant delay.

When you say she can't combine words, is that words in any language? 2 consecutive words in one language? Can she say individual words in any language? The same word in more than one?

It's really not uncommon for bilingual children even at a more advanced age to be behind their monolingual peers in terms of linguistic ability but every child is different. I knew a quadrilingual child who had what I would describe as MT competence in 3 of those languages, even if her command of those languages was a year or so behind her biological age. I also know bilingual children who, as far as I can tell from my experience of working with children, have MT competence in both languages above their biological age or both languages significantly below their biological age. It's just that when the child is 9 and they speak like a 7 year old it's less noticeable than a 2 year difference at 3 years old.

OP you're doing the right thing by going to the SALT but is this SALT working in your daughter's L1 or her L3? If L1 is her strongest language an L3 assessment won't provide an accurate picture.

I do think that if your DD does have a speech and language difficult of some mind you might need to seriously consider putting 1 of the languages on hold for a time to maximise input from another language to cement the acquisition, but I'm not a SALT. Until then I'd carry on as you are and just talk, talk, talk using simple, repetitive phrases and encourage her to supply answers.

Get professional advice but make sure they have a background in dealing with multilingual children. There are speech therapists and early childhood teachers who will tell you point blank that bilingualism/multilingualism is inherently detrimental.

It may be that you don't need to completely drop a language or two, just that you need increased exposure to the community language and regularly therapy in that language. It will mean the 2 other languages will start to lag considerably but, provided they're not stopped completely there will be opportunities later to focus on them if need be.

Nobody here will be able to give a definitive response as it takes testing to determine whether it's a generic speech delay or an organic brain issue.

@ragged - children's brains are remarkably plastic, what they learn quickly they can also loose quickly. Whilst being exposed to sounds pre-birth and onwards provides a basis, it doesn't always last.

I have a friend with a Japanese mother who spoke mostly Japanese to age 5. Once she started going to school she resisted speaking Japanese so mum let it drop. She later wanted to learn Japanese as an adult so went to live there for a few years. Her Japanese is pretty bad, certainly worse than plenty of adult learners I know with no background in the language at all.

thank for the other replies...

she is just starting to combine (i.e. 2-word-phrases) in L1.

Salt will probably speak only English (L3) but I will see how we get on.

a lot of her pronunciation is also really bad and muddled... all 3-syllable words for example sound pretty much the same and I can only decipher them through the context.