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Recently I was asked for a description of what we've been doing for our three+ year old's delayed language development. It proved useful for the individual requesting the information, and I thought it might be useful to others, so here it is:
The key for us was when we were told to intensify our efforts: to repeat words more frequently and make sure we had his attention when we spoke. Until then we'd played a variety of dvds for him, introducing him to language and imagination and such. They included Disney animated movies and Barney shows. We also had a few Baby Einstein dvds, designed to be vocabulary builders.
We figured that the Disney and Barney were too advanced for him to follow, we ended up purchasing all the baby Einstein collection and that is all we played for him. It took him a couple of weeks but he started repeating the words on the dvds (we'd been repeating them every time the words appeared for those two weeks). Once he started repeating the words we'd praise him profusely, make a big production out of it, which encouraged him tremendously. He started repeating more words, never pronouncing them very well but clearly enough we could tell he was trying.
We went for about a month or six weeks like that when we realized he just wasn't getting enough from the Baby Einstein.
A case worker offered to loan us a copy of a Baby Bumblebee video, another company that designs vocabulary builders. it was more intensive than BE, providing more words as well as action words. With his exposure to BE he was well trained to learn the words on BB. We bought the collection.
By 2 and a half my son had learned to load and play the dvd player. We'd been leaving the dvds available to him so he could explore at his own discretion. After we'd pulled everything but BE and BB, that's all he watched. Sometimes he'd watch several over a day, sometimes the same one. But he was -always- repeating the words (or making the effort).
As well as the dvds, we talk with him, ask him what colour his block is, ask him how many pegs it has, and so on. I've used a chalk board to help him complete words when he only pronounces one of the syllables in the word. I'd write the word on the board and underline the first syllable while saying it, he'd repeat that and then I underline the second syllable and say it. he repeats that and then I underline the whole word and say it all. He usually makes the effort to repeat what I say.
One of the BBs teaches the alphabet, which my son got good at saying. So we wrote the alphabet on the board, along with numbers to ten, shapes, and colours. Then I'd point to each and he'd tell me what it is. if he said it well I'd praise him and if he had problems I'd say "good try" and then name the item correctly and give him another chance.
Last month we re-introduced Oswald (an animated octopus) and Kipper (an animated dog) videos and he started trying to repeat their dialog and sing their songs.
I think one of the big breakthroughs was when he learned how to say "cookie". Food is one of the best rewards, and encouraging him to say a word for food he likes allows you to reward him with that food. If you worry about how much he gets, keep an empty cookie bag handy and load it with the number of cookies he can have in a day. Hide the full bag. When he asks for a cookie offer him one from the near-empty bag. When he's had all he's allowed, show him the bag is empty and say "all gone". It helps a lot and wards off tantrums.
We also found that it helped our son to move on from one activity to another by saying "bye bye" to whatever it is he's doing. By saying "bye bye, thank you, see you soon" in a sing-song voice we helped him to realize it was time to do something else. He'd join in the ceremony and then he'd be ready to move on.
In the above account I totally forgot to mention the books my wife reads to our son. He loves "The Gruffalo" and it was the first 'script' he learned to imitate.
I should also advise that you not get locked into the 'blame/guilt' game. Too little is known about language delay to support a theory. In the case of my son, I prefer to believe he had other things to learn first, and now it is language's turn.
One more piece of advice, language delay looks a lot like some of the symptoms of autism spectrum disorder. Our son has been diagnosed as within the spectrum (though not by much). Our pediatrician has made it clear she down't think our son will fit within the spectrum in a year or two. We found that very reassuring.
I won't tell you to ignore your medical professionals. But with our son, none of the 'symptoms' of autism could not be explained better by a little boy trying hard to communicate without language. As language has developed, all of his former habits that appeared autistic have been disappearing (he liked shredding tissue paper for quite awhile, but he never does it now).
I hope this gives you hope with your little one.
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