2.5 year old not talking yet, positive stories please

[malteaserlover]

My son turns 2.5 this month and he's not talking yet, he says oh no regularly though. We've had his hearing checked and that's fine and he's on the wait list for salt. He's got a great understanding. Anyone else's child the same at this age and when did they start talking? Did it start gradually or all of a sudden? Thank you

My now-adult DD was 3 and still not talking besides general babble. We got new neighbours with two little girls who she wanted to play with - suddenly she started talking in sentences ! She is now an academic and gives very learned speeches , so it all worked out well in the end.

My eldest was very late to talk! When he dud talk he was difficult to understand. He's now 7 and literally never shuts up!

He does have an ASD diagnosis but his difficulties are around social interaction and appropriate interactions (he's overly loveable and has no concept of personal space).

@starrynight21 did your DD use jargons. Like strong of unintelligible words.

Mine wouldn't talk. He was day dreamy and quiet.

Turned out he was deaf with glue ear. He needed grommets asap. He caught up with all speech and listening skills - and hasn't stopped talking yet (8 years later!)

In fact, I think he wasn't talking until 3 YO as Nursery arranged a EHCP which helped bump us up the grommets queue.

He had them done just before he started school.

No ear infections or anything like that. So we had no idea! Poor thing!

(Has long term balance issues though which has been attributed to his ears!)

@Mammyloveswine your son sounds really wonderful 🙂

@AnxiousBanxious that is great to hear. Ear infections seem to be a common cause of speech delay.

@NewMum118 with my DS I’d ask him to do random things such as put his shoes on the table/under the table/by the sofa then worked up to more complicated things like put the green block (out of the choice of three say) on the desk. Or hiding games where you ‘hide’ a few favourite toys and ask him to get the red car and he’d go off and find it etc. Put the can in the cupboard etc when unpacking shopping.

Mainly I just talked a lot at them explaining everything and he picked up what I meant as we went along. Your HV will give you lots of examples of things to try assuming he/she isn’t a dragon!

DS is still behind a bit on speech and school are getting him speech therapy, but he’s come on leaps and bounds.

Thanks @MuchTooTired this sounds about what I also did for my dc. I would like to know if anybody has any tips for expressive language.
Currently he just points to things I ask him. Like if I ask him "where is your monkey" he would point to his monkey toy.
But if I hold up his monkey toy and ask him what it is he won't say anything.
On the other hand he does say monkey sometimes on looking at that toy.

This is just one example. How can I help him express it to me.

I could have written your post op.
DS is 13 now and fine. We went from having a grand total of 5 words he could say (that I could understand) to 100 in 3 months and then I stopped counting.
On the plus side his listening skills were extremely well developed and are still better than most people's 😁
His reading age is well above his actual age too, there is nothing wrong with his language skills, he was just developing other areas and got there when he was ready.
Just keep modelling one step on from where she is whenever you communicate together. So if she has no word (maybe points or gestures or makes noise) show her she could use one (I e up, give, plate, dog etc), if she has one use two (i.e walk slow, big ball) etc.

Our friends son just turned 3, and the change between 2.5 and 3 has been astounding. Took him a minute but he’s conversing, even with us. They started speech therapy a few weeks ago but he really got there in his own time.

My Ds was the same and we had speech therapy advice which at this level was -
Instead of asking questions to elicit the answer you hope to hear .. You model what he does now + 1 step forward... So what you want him to do next.

You do this whenever there is a moment he should be using language (so you echo his meaning but with a tiny bit of development added), So every interaction becomes an example of what he can be doing.
So, if he points and doesn't speak or just makes a noise when he sees his toy... you become his demo of 'what you could say here' (to think of it that way) so, you point and say 'monkey'.

If he wants a drink, and to tell you that he gestures at the jug (or whatever), you indicate the jug and say drink etc etc

If he used a word like 'daddy?' when looking for daddy, you would echo his question but model 1 step on, so 'where's daddy?'
Etc etc

His days become sprinkled with many achievable examples directly related to what he is thinking about in that exact moment and this helps bridge the developmental gap and bring him on in from where he is now.

@NewMum118 from memory, I think one of the ‘games’ I was encouraged to play was hide some of his favourite toys in a bag or something and get him to tell me what it is, or where it is. Or hold it up away from him and get him to say what the toy is that I’m holding because he wanted it. I personally didn’t like doing this because it seemed cruel to upset a non verbal child to force him to speak. If you ask him to copy monkey for example does he give it a go? OTT praise worked really well for mine, I was thrilled any time he gave it a go. I probably did the wrong thing but I didn’t play masses of the ‘cruel’ (to me!) games and went the gentler route of encouragement whilst playing because I didn’t have the stomach for upsetting him especially because i could clearly see his frustration already (he’d hit and hurt himself).

@MuchTooTired he copies quite well. I had taught him "eat" like that. Now he says eat everytime he sees his lunch plate or if he is hungry.
I will try the hiding game. You are right some of these things are upsetting as i don't want him to cry.
He has started placing demands in a game we play. I make a monkey sound then he says "frro" to make me make frog sound and then ge says bee for bee sound. He did that yesterday.

Thanks @PimpMyFridge i will try these.

After some advise, my son is 2 years 4 months and he only says mum, yes and no. He calls everyone mum. He understands, if I ask him wheres dad, wheres your brother, can you get me a toy, wheres your nose etc he will point but he won't say anything. My 1st boy was babbling away by now (even if we couldn't always understand him he was trying) but my 2nd doesn't even seem to attempt speech. Has anyone else had this, I am booked to see health visitor in a month, and am trying to get booked in with SALT. Am concerned if there's anything else I should be doing to help him. xxx

he has also started making his own sign language, like lipping lips means ice lolly, rubbing tummy means hungry, pulling his finger means take the wrapper off. xx

I always say this but take him to the GP and request a hearing test at the hospital. Don't be fobbed off by some rudimentary little checks at the surgery.

My second piece of advice is to hold on to something he wants and say the name of it. Then wait for him to use his voice. Help him learn that his voice is important. Any sound would do at this point.

I'm an ex SLT.

I saw many children like this. The important thing is if they understand and interact socially. If they don't there's a higher chance of difficulties later on. If they do, chances are they'll be alright.

Ps SLT is generally rubbish, but do have.a look at the Hanen approach and Parent-Child interaction therapy.

@MiksJ36 absolutely insist on hearing tests, even those done my the hearing service missed my DDs hearing issue

SaLT here. You’ve been given some really good advice so far. Some children are just speech delayed but when their understanding is good they are far more likely to catch up.

Things I’d add are:

sound play - so if whole words are tricky at the moment encourage symbolic sounds during play like animal noises, transport noises, ‘mm’ when eating, ‘sh’ when playing with a doll etc…

Choices - make everything you can in the day a choice even when you know what he is going to going to choose and model each word as you say. This gives him a chance to practise communicating his needs. For example ‘red’ or ‘blue’ t shirt when getting dressed ‘big’ or ‘little’ cup when getting a drink, different snacks, different toys etc

Try not to anticipate needs - for example a child who also has their drinks bottle full and within reach is never going ask for a drink. Set up opportunities throughout the way where you can model how to ask for the things he needs.

Play anticipation games eg pausing when you blow bubbles or when you a pushing cars down a slope. Model asking for ‘more’ or ‘go’ and leave lots of pauses to allow his chances to this.

Avoid questions - i know it’s tempting to ask ‘what’s this’ etc but everytime you do this you’re missing an opportunity to model what he could be saying instead. Focus on exposing him to vocabulary rather than testing him at the moment.

These are all so reassuring - my DS is 19 months with very little words (can say mama, Choo choo for train, moo for cow etc but only when prompted) and understands a fair amount (doesn't always listen though!) I'm so desperate to hear some proper words!

Hello,

I have a wonderful 26 month old soon who is not talking and I am trying not to panic! He has weeks when he’s saying mama, dada and baba and we think, that’s it, he’s gonna talk now but then radio silence, not a word. He babbles non stop and seems to have invented a language that only he can understand. He has good gestures and points to everything and seems to understand more than we even know! He’s sociable and so happy all the time with a great sense of humour. Takes turns, doesn’t get upset easily and keeps himself busy all the time. He understands complex instructions and has a fantastic memory and analytical skills, but why is he not talking??! We read to him all the time, talk non stop, explain what we’re doing but nothing seems to work. Whenever he wants something, he points at it and if I don’t react, he starts shouting instead of saying mama or dada. What should we do? We booked him in for an evaluation so hopefully it will all turn out to be okay..any advice or positive stories? 🙏

DD had 3 very basic words at 3 - at 5 she will now not shut up and has a great vocabulary

DS had about 10 noises (no actual words) at 2.5, but good understanding.

By 3.5 he had pretty much caught up with language.

Later he was diagnosed with autism; his speech delay was very probably connected with that. He is happy and did v well in his GCSEs (including English!) and A-levels. He's away at university now and loving it.

My son has exactly 5 words (that I could make out but strangers might struggle) at 2.5 yo.
He had speech therapy advice for speech delay which we followed.
Maybe he'd have been gone anyway, but he's certainly fine now, 13yo.
On the plus side, his listening skills were great then (since his developed language skills were all receptive and not productive) and are second to none now! He's a teen boy who really makes you feel heard when you talk to him. Awwww.