Bilingual 23 month old still not saying anything much...a cause for concern?

[pipoca]

Hi,

I wonder if anyone can give me some ideas of how normal this sounds?

DS is being brought up bilingually English and Spanish and is about to turn 2 (23 months next week). He was a month premature in case that makes any difference, although I'm sure it doesn't.

He can say no (since about 15 mo), poo, nana for banana and other fruits, baaa/baboom for ball/balloon and has previously said gok for clock and bean, altho now doesn't say them at all. In Spanish he has two words. He also says Mama for mummy (Mama being the Spanish word for mummy) and Dada for daddy.

He can do a whole range of animal noises (elephant, monkey, horse, duck, bird, sheep, cow, snake, chicken) when asked or when he sees them and also does a noise for purrr when he sees the cat and a little noise like the dog makes when she's drinking if he sees or wants water. Oh, he can also say Uh Uh for up up when he wants to be lifted onto the slide. And a hohoho noise when something is hot.

From what I've heard, that all seems maybe to be a bit slow to me, even if he's bilingual and sometimes I worry that his speech should be further on? He understands EVERYTHING in both languages. I am constantly amazed by his level of understanding, but I sometimes wonder about the actual language production...does it sound normal to you?

Thanks.

Absolutely normal for a bilingual. A lot of them have a tendency to absorb both languages first and only really produce in both once they've sorted them out mentally, in other words, there's a large difference between passive acquisition and active production. DD1 only started learning German at nursery at 13 months, and that slowed her English learning right down until she was three, at which point she started producing both languages with no problems. Now at 11 she is completely, happily bilingual with excellent vocabulary in both.

Trilingual DD had only a few words at 2 yrs. Her paediatrician said "As long as she says ONE word correctly, no need for concern". True enough, now she is 4.5 and can talk your ears off in any of her three languages.

Thanks, he babbles away constantly and he does uses his handful of words quite a lot, pointing out that there's dog poo on the street...Poo! Poo! and as I say the understanding in both is quite amazing. I'll just be patient then.

I was worrying a little cos I read a thread with people saying the saying a word and then seeming to store it away and not use it again was a worry. Altho that was about monolinguals.

thanks everyone, i feel calmer.
x