Seedlings hosted a workshop on Tuesday April 1st presented by Speech Therapy Centres of Canada. During the workshop we learned important tips and information to build a child's receptive language (understanding/comprehension) & their eventual verbal skills.
No matter what stage your child is at it is important to talk to them to build both their receptive language (understanding/comprehension) & their eventual verbal skills. Children who are not meeting verbal milestones may not be experiencing an issue if they are social, indicate their wants/needs in other ways e.g. pointing and they demonstrate understanding.
During the workshop being presented by Speech Therapy Centres of Canada we received important tips and information to:
Understand the benefits of early identification and treatment where needed
Assess if your child requires speech therapy
Learn about the latest treatment options
Bring the learning home with a series of at-home activities to help your child improve their speech and communication
Some basic language guidelines by age:
12 months –child chatters to toys or people using at least three different sounds and understand simple requests
18 months – uses common expressions e.g. all gone, oh-oh, says five or more words, points to at least 3 different body parts when asked
2 years – learns/uses one or more new words per week, joins two words together
2 ½ years – joins 3 words together, uses prononus (I, you, me & mine), recognizes the names and pictures of most common items
3 years –speaks clearly most of the time, uses two to five word sentences, correctly says the words my, home, pie, hop bee, bib, no, man, one
4 years – says rhymes/sings songs, asks lots of questions, correctly says the words two, hat, do, mud, fun, off, key, cookie, go, hug
Speech & language assessment is available both through government agencies (doctor referral) or through private speech and language agencies.