When should you start to be concerned about indistinct speech in a toddler?

[Pruni]

DS is two and a half, and he's talking a lot. However, much of it is pretty indistinct. I can make out most of his meaning, but others can't, including his father. I only realise this when I have to translate for him to family members and I genuinely have no idea what's normal. His peers all seem to be way ahead but they are girls and I'm not worried about the stage he's at, just the slurriness of it.

Phoneme-wise, he is fine, and his grammar is coming on in leaps and bounds (spot the linguistics graduate) but it's such a mish-mash most of the time.

Ds 2 1/4
Am waiting for appointment with speech therapist - 6 mths wait - don't get me started - I am seething.
Can not pronounce the start of any word.
Says ooes = shoes
ootball = football
axe = Jack
ice = rice
asta = pasta
May be I am worrying unnecesarily.
But its better to get it checked out .
And for someone to tell you, nothings wrong.
Rather than you wondering, and then with hindsight, wishing you had done something.

Entirely normal Oblomov.

However,of course you are right to seek an assessment with a salt if at all concerned.
Salts would rather this,and then send a parent on her way with words of reassurance than miss out on identifying children with speech/lang. difficulties at an early age.

Re the wait,entirely normal I am afraid.
There aren't enough salts,it is a desperately understaffed occupation.

Anyone intersted in training to be one??

Bozza,the 'pweez' is sweet!

oh its so nice to find you mizmiz.
What are the words 'helicopter' or strawberry' or 'spaghetti' - actually testing then ?

We have el-opter, erry, etti.

Oblmomov :) dd for aaaaaaaages couldn't pronouce wourds where 2 consonants were together, e.g. steps would be teps or swing would be wing. Caused some confusion with some words

Strangely enough she always dropped the first letter :)

mizmiz - had to wait nearly 2 years for my autistic ds to see a SALT. I think we are probably one of the worst areas in the country. If I had known I would have liked to have trained as one.

One of the worst periods was when ds was using his own words quite often completely out of context. Like asking for 'bread soup'. I had to work out that this was tomato soup. He used the word bread merely because it sounds like 'red' and sometimes he called tomato soup red soup. Drove me mad him diong this but fortunately this phase didn't last long.

Sorry I seem to have strayed off the topic somewhat...

Can I untrain as one?

That seems attractive at times.

Pruni they ask at yr 2yr check whether you can understand half of what yr child says.
(I couldn't with DS1).
The range to achieve this is 18mo to 2.5 yrs IIRC.
So if as you suggest you can understand everything, I wouldn't worry.
A friend has a little boy a bit younger than my ds2 (who is just 3) and he says a lot of half words so she often has to translate. But it's fine, as I say that's better than DS1 was and he talks very well now! (he's nearly 7, tho did need speech therapy, but that was for certain sounds that were slow to come).

"Spaghetti" really hard to say, apparently that was the hardest work for Kirk Douglas to relearn after his stroke. DS1 offered "setty" for ages.

Having had a dd with speech delay, and going through the same martian language phase the SLT's were not bothered at all at 2.5 nor 3, but said to review at 3.5 between 3 and 3.5 dd suddenly began improving and now at 3.5 has no delays at all. It can literally happen overnight - she improved massively just by one or two nursery sessions.
It was so bad at one stage I was the only person who could understand her and even that was very hit and miss. Now she is fine.
So ive him a little time try not to worry, it sounds like he has so many skills lanaguage wise, when he does become more widely understandable he'll be a master orator

Clary, 2-yr checks not done here unless you have concerns. I can understand him most of the time. If he's still slurring/telescoping/mashing his sentences at 3 then I'll get him checked out.

Clary my ds had a slt appointment at 2 and a half and the slt thought he was fine- hv had had me worried. That was 3 months ago and he is now talking a lot more and it makes life a lot easier and less tantrums. What is considered "normal" covers a huge spectrum.
Sorry don't mean to hijack but really can't miss the pportunity to ask- Mizmiz and Mogwai I am really interested in being a slt and would love to apply this year but cannot afford to be a student and pay for childcare yet.As it is going to be hugely difficult to make the changes to enable I would really like to know an inside view on the job iykwim to help me decide and persuade dh I would be really grateful if I could ask you both a bit more.Will look later as taking dd to her gym class.

Sorry meant to say "pruni" not clary

I would love to be an SALT... it all really interests me. How does one go about doing this?

Xavielli
It is a 4 year bsc or a post grad of 2years I think.I am thinking of a the post grad but I am not sure how I will manage it. The courses are very oversubscribed . Hopefully you may get a reply from a trained salt .

lol Mogwai!
As you know have been taking a career break for a few years so have the ole' rose coloured glasses on maybe.

Oblomov,I suggest those words as they have lots of 'consonant clusters' which of course are harder for a child with developing speech.

'dog' versus 'strawberry'

You can see why one is harder!
See MrsBigD's examples too-all consonant clusters.

Eulalia,it's not off topic at all-speech and language problems are commonly inter twined. Your child was actually creating his own set of rules,something many do.
A salt's job in effect is to uncover this secret set of rules that they are operating by and think of ways to get them to unlearn it and learn the mainstream rules,which are,in layperson's terms,grammar and pronunciation.

This is why being a salt is so much fun.A lot of it is detective work.
Thus,if a child comes in with curious speech patterns,by 'testing' him on carefully chosen words and phrases,the salt will be able to predict how he will say words she has never heard him say.

There is invariably a method in the madness.

Colette,you are right re training.I did the 2 year PG course (Mogwai did the 4 year u/g one I think??)It was very tough going,exhilarating but tough.
Some people on our course had kids but I didn't.

The 4 year course would be a (slightly) gentler option.

Some trusts sponsor people (as there is such a shortage.)
I would suggest you approach your local head of salt department directly for an informal chat,and look at the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists' website for more info.

\link{http://www.rcslt.org.uk\Here}

I'm embarking on an OU degree with a view to training as an SLT after that
I have been inspired by "working" hard with my won dd, to exactly the pattern that mizmiz describes - like a puzzle, finding their little patterns and intercepting and changing the pattern
Has been so rewarding with dd, would love to have it as a career, am too far away from the right uni to do the 4 yr course though, but maybe in 3-4 yrs the scope will have widened perhaps, or I'll have moved

Piffle which OU degree may I ask .. I have been considering SALT training (there's a 2 year post-grad course) ... but I don't have a relevant first degree and won't be able to do it for about 3 years

My DS was a wee bit slow to talk - mostly nonsense until after 2 and he is now getting really good at 2.9 but I still sometimes have to translate for DH and others. I am not worried as there is steady progress and he goes to nursery in august where I am sure he will come on in leaps and bounds.

Not sure Twig, I did one year of phonetics and linguitics in NZ as well as Russian, politics and Spanish, so should be able to cross credit some, onto more linguistics/psych maybe

I am also madly contemplating a horticulture degree, not to be and SLT of course but as I love gardening so much...

My daughter just three is being refered to a speech therapist. I would say about half of what she says you would struggle to understand and she has particular trouble with s and sh - making a strange sound instead. Over the last few days she has started to stutter alot. She pointed at an owl in a picture book. She knows the word but struggled to get it out for ages and then looked at me and said quite clearly "you do it". Quite funny if I wan't so worried!

inycon I read about the stuttering - apparently it's normal at that age, brain working faster than mouth sort-of-thing.

schneebly

O.K. so can you tell me if i am just kidding myself here?

Ds2 is 2 1/4, and can say 4 words. He babbles all the time but has no interest in forming words. He understands most things, is physically very well, but we have recenty moved abroad, so he is coping with another language at nursery.

Before we left I had some niggles about his speech as he hadn't formed any words, but now I hear myself saying it's because of the second language. I am not yet familiar with the HV system yet and may need to ask about what process I need to go through to get him seen.

Do I leave it or should I do something now? Any advice would be so welcome.

Pruni - I don't but used to sing in a gaelic choir!