Gosh- this thread has brought back a lot of memories. My ds had the full multi-disciplinary work up and it took an inordinately long time to diagnose that he didn't have an autistic spectrum disorder but instead a pretty severe SAL condition. He could not express himself to others with speech and could not understand what others were saying to him.....effectively he was having to be in his own little world, especially with other children who could not make the correct allowances for him. It was heartbreaking to watch him as he took a long, long time to make friends and then only 1 or 2 people, generally the only 3, 4 and 5 year olds who would stay still for long enough to chat to him slowly. We were advised by a very, very good HV at the time that we would know one way or the other by age 7 and she was spot on. I still have video of him at age 4, really really struggling to speak clearly and make sense alongside his very straightforward and sparky younger sister, but when you fast forward to age 7, he'd come on in leaks and bounds, had some friends, could speak far more fluently in more complex sentences (although with some amazingly mixed up sentences at times....really interesting to hear) With the benefit of hindsight, the following things helped;
Having other siblings (if able to) and especially the younger ones as our ds could talk in baby language with them and gain some real confidence from being understood, loved and laughed with.
Tutoring on the basics of maths and english. He was missing much of the meaning of his lessons as by the time he'd worked out what the first sentence meant, he was then missing the second and third ones. He would frequently write out what was on the board as he didn't know what he supposed to be doing. He leapt forward about 2 school years in 6 months, just because somebody sat down with him and explained it through pictures and other SALTechniques.
SALT, although it's purely giving the techniques to the parents to then practice at home...not sure what I had thought it would be any different but there you go!
As little time and other pressure as possible. I had to actively back off from speeding to places and didn't add on the usual group of after school activities etc. We had to give him time and room to process.
My ds is now 13 and still finds english difficult (and embedded maths in english) and the SAL issue has now been narrowed considerably, although will be a lifelong problem. When he was first diagnosed the SALT said that he would grow out of it by early teens.
My last piece of advice would be, listen, take in all the advice but still judge all of it on your own child, who can really surprise you and definitely the experts. They will tend to underestimate what can be done through sheer hard work and determination, especially on the part of the child. My ds works his bits off and it's really starting to pay off now.