Colour blindness?

[HarryHarry]

Does anyone have any experience of having a colour blind child?

My son is 20 months old. I noticed recently that every time I ask him what colour something is, he shouts “red” or “green”, obviously just guessing. Sometimes he will say “blue”. I am starting to wonder if he can actually see colour. Is it normal for a toddler to just shout out the names of colours at random or can he really not tell the difference?

If you have a colour blind child, when did you first notice it and how has it affected them?

At 20 mins he is far too young to have learnt colours.

I have a colour blind child. He was only diagnosed in reception. Prior to that he wasn't great with colours and had difficulty picking out more subtle tones. I remember showing him goldfish in a pond and he couldn't see them . His colour blindness does not really affect him on a daily basis. He needs help with colouring pencils and colour coding on eg maps. Otherwise he is a happy child doing well at school and in life! If you are concerned I would speak to your GP and see what they advise regarding the earliest that testing can take place.

Sounds like my 2 year old but she's still learning.
I think your expecting too much too soon. Don't worry about it. X

I think he's too young to have learnt them yet. Don't worry about it.

Thank you for your replies - you are probably right that he is too young. I just thought that once he knew that this colour was called green and that colour was called red, he would be able to point them out when he saw them again and name them correctly. Like he does with so many other things.

I’m colour blind and so is my DS. We can both tell the difference between red, blue, yellow etc. We just don’t see them the same as everyone else. Some very pale or murky shades blend in to each other and we can’t differentiate but we learned the colours of the rainbow like everyone else.

eye specialist here.
Agree hes too young

My ds was diagnosed at 3. He knew all his colours and his key worker was so convinced the hospital had got it wrong that she kept 'testing' him at preschool.... He would get the trains mixed up in thomas the tank engine. I wouldn't worry about it just yet.

You can definitely tell if children lean towards colour blindness when they’re young, but not through asking them.

Put a pile of objects on the floor, some red, some green, some yellow, some blue. About 5 or 6 of each colour. Duplo bricks work well, but you can add other items for variety

Put 4 pieces of paper, or towels on the floor, a red one, a blue one, a yellow one and a green one, and ask your child to match the colours. You go first, then ask them to find the same colour.

It’s definitely not fool proof, it depends how much your child understands, but you should be able to see if they are mistaking red/green for example.

When DS1 was about 2, if you asked him what the colour of something was, he would say “yellow” every single time. DH got quite worried about the possibility of colour blindness.

DS1’s not colour blind. Once he got a bit older and his vocabulary improved, he started identifying colours correctly.

Our guess is that he’d learnt that “yellow” was a word associated with colours, but hadn’t yet figured out that other colours had different names.

@boohome That’s good to know. Must just be something toddlers do, I guess!

@FREEM Thanks that makes me feel better!

I know I’m probably worrying about nothing.

He's too young to be certain but of course he maybe! I have 2 children that have colour deficiency (it's very very very rare to be completely colour blind). My DH is colour deficient and my Dbro is colour deficient. We have a son and a daughter who have colour deficiency (DD being more unusual as she's picked up my Colour deficiency X as well has her Dad's). Anyway with our Ds I knew that he was at about 2. He simply couldn't get red and green the right way round at all despite vastly accelerated speech (sentences at 15 months old). With DD (we have 8 children btw) I wasn't certain until the opticians confirmed at 6 that she was.

And I'd also say really don't worry!! It doesn't make that much difference- DH did think that the carpet he'd help me choose for our house was grey for 5 years until it came up in convo and I had to tell him it was actually a green colour with brown and grey flecks....and None fo them can join the RAF or become pilots or electricians (I think!).

Colours are an abstract concept. You have to figure out what the person is talking about i.e. 'red' means the colour and not the fact that car has big wheels. Also the 'boundaries' between colours are trickier e.g. a blue and green Lego brick are probably closer in shade than a blue brick is to the sky. There is a lot to figure out!