DS2 (3.8, receptive language delay) can now answer the following kinds of questions:
- "where's DS1?" - answer, "in the sitting room". He has also started to ask "where's mummy?"
- "what's that?" - pointing to an object or an object in a picture.
- "do you want X or Y?" "what's your best? X or Y?" (ie which do you prefer?)
He has the following further skills: can carry out commands like "Simon says crawl backwards then jump!" "Simon says kiss the curtain then touch your tummy!" (2-step command with an element of dicrimination in at least one of the steps). He will attempt to process 3-step commands with no discriminations within steps - it's so cute to see him thinking about it. He understands opposites (fascinated by naming the hot and cold taps), finds negatives easy (spontaneously points out that a picture of a cat has "no whiskers!"). He spontaneously attempts to tell me what happened at nursery (it's incomprehensible but sometimes the staff can translate it into "I sat on the ice-cream table!").
I think we are "in the zone" for categories. He spontaneously points out that "mummy's a lady, daddy's a man"- we did not teach him this.
I also think we are in the zone for object functions - DH has had some success pointing at a completed jigsaw of an outdoor scene making requests like "point to the one that's flying".
There is so little material on teaching receptive speech - I would love DS2 to be able to answer questions like "which animal says moo?" (he can answer "what does a cow say?" but that's much much simpler) and "what's your teacher's name?"
Any guidance on suitable targets and techniques would, as ever, be greatly appreciated.