Improving receptive language

[faerierose]

My ds is about to turn 3! We are transitioning from EI to the SD and it isn't going well. The SD has offered him 1/2 hour a ST a week: They know he needs more then that but they are understaffed, underfunded, you know the drill The whole thing makes me want to tell them to bug off and find a different way to get his st, I might be able to get it through his medical coverage. In the meantime I'm looking for ways to help him with his receptive language. The EI therapist really focused on expresive language but ds uses alot of echolia and scripting, he doesn't ask/answer questions. He still doesn't use gestures (but will imitate someone if they do). He is using more words on his own in a very declarative manner, he will drag me to the fridge and say "milk" for instance but won't answer if I ask him if he wants milk.
I have tried to google it but I can't find much info on how to help him with his receptive language. Anyone have any ideas?

[lightheart]

quick thought, look for other st outside the school but keep him in the school program too, it's a great way to get to know the way things work within their system.

we go 30-45 min to school a week and then 1hr to a center.

[Sierra]

Just off the top of my head:

I am thinking that part of the reason it is hard to find stuff on helping our kids with receptive language, and why therapists don't do much about it, is that we don't at this point in time have good ways to help. Someone help me sort this out...

From what I understand, receptive delays have these types of sources:

1. Hearing difficulties
2. Auditory processing disorders...neurological functioning
3. Cognitive challenges...again, neurological/cognitive basis

Coping skills, adaptations, and modifications in communication-- or in the case of, for example, being hard of hearing, a non-oral language, seem to better address these situations than interventions.

I know there is some limited stuff out there in terms of auditory processing training. Listening labs, music therapies, and stuff. We're just now reaching the right age for these types of things, so I have no experience in this arena.

[lil_stinkyfeet]

I am having a hard time doing anything to improve ds's receptive language mainly because I can't make him understand anything kwim?

It is VERY hard for me to do that. I mostly repeat, repeat, repeat and use actions. It took me a good full 10min the other day to explain to ds that I wanted him to pick up the bottle of water that was in front of him and hand it to me. I had to mostly use motions. it is SO hard to improve their receptive language if they just simply don't get it.

I will be lurking on this thread though to see if anyone has any tips

[lil_stinkyfeet]

Originally Posted by lightheart

quick thought, look for other st outside the school but keep him in the school program too, it's a great way to get to know the way things work within their system.

we go 30-45 min to school a week and then 1hr to a center.

I also agree with this, unfortunately we can't get any services right now through EI but If I could I would also look into private therapy in addition to the School services. I did this when Haylen was smaller and needed OT and PT they were only offering once a week, so we enlisted in private therapy on the side for a while.

[faerierose]

Originally Posted by lightheart

quick thought, look for other st outside the school but keep him in the school program too, it's a great way to get to know the way things work within their system.

we go 30-45 min to school a week and then 1hr to a center.

I was thinking about that but I need to find a st not associated with the school or EI and the nearest one I've found is an hour away. There are no programs or centers in my area but I'm going to keep looking.

[lil_stinkyfeet]

Originally Posted by faerierose

I was thinking about that but I need to find a st not associated with the school or EI and the nearest one I've found is an hour away. There are no programs or centers in my area but I'm going to keep looking.

What about your local hospital? Mine is at my hospital.

[faerierose]

Originally Posted by Sierra

Just off the top of my head:

I am thinking that part of the reason it is hard to find stuff on helping our kids with receptive language, and why therapists don't do much about it, is that we don't at this point in time have good ways to help. Someone help me sort this out...

From what I understand, receptive delays have these types of sources:

1. Hearing difficulties
2. Auditory processing disorders...neurological functioning
3. Cognitive challenges...again, neurological/cognitive basis

Coping skills, adaptations, and modifications in communication-- or in the case of, for example, being hard of hearing, a non-oral language, seem to better address these situations than interventions.

I know there is some limited stuff out there in terms of auditory processing training. Listening labs, music therapies, and stuff. We're just now reaching the right age for these types of things, so I have no experience in this arena.

Thanks for explaining that, sometimes it's hard to sort out. lol We've ruled out hearing problems. Ds has global delays so it's hard to say right now if he has an APD or if his language dely is from Cognative challenges. I can see in theory how modifications and adaptions can help but non of the things we have tried have helped much. He won't use signs, the pecs didn't interest him, and we just got a communication builder with pictures that talks and he just takes it apart or presses it repeatedly for no reason. He doesn't get what it's for and I have no idea how to help. I think he's just not ready for it but the st (both of them actually) think it's perfect and want him to try and use it. Sorry if I'm rambling, it's been a long day.

[faerierose]

Originally Posted by lil_stinkyfeet

What about your local hospital? Mine is at my hospital.

I'm going to check the next town over but so far everything I've located is in OKC

[bdavis337]

You know, the thing that worked best for improving MT's receptive language and his overall responses to us was constant modeling. He would drag me to the kitchen, pointing and whining at the cabinet for a granola bar or whatever, and I'd say "Mummy, I want a granola bar". It took months and months, but eventually he got to the point where he'd say "Mummy, I want the bar bar".

We moved from that to modeling answers, so I'd ask him "do you want me to peel the banana?" and his typical answer would be to echo back my question. So I model "yes peel the banana". We're still in this stage. He can answer readily if he wants to say NO, but for YES he still echos back or prances around on his toes laughing.

So model model model until you are talking to yourself in your sleep.

[faerierose]

Originally Posted by lil_stinkyfeet

I am having a hard time doing anything to improve ds's receptive language mainly because I can't make him understand anything kwim?

It is VERY hard for me to do that. I mostly repeat, repeat, repeat and use actions. It took me a good full 10min the other day to explain to ds that I wanted him to pick up the bottle of water that was in front of him and hand it to me. I had to mostly use motions. it is SO hard to improve their receptive language if they just simply don't get it.

I will be lurking on this thread though to see if anyone has any tips

Repeat, repeat, pepeat, that's us too

[faerierose]

Originally Posted by bdavis337

You know, the thing that worked best for improving MT's receptive language and his overall responses to us was constant modeling. He would drag me to the kitchen, pointing and whining at the cabinet for a granola bar or whatever, and I'd say "Mummy, I want a granola bar". It took months and months, but eventually he got to the point where he'd say "Mummy, I want the bar bar".

We moved from that to modeling answers, so I'd ask him "do you want me to peel the banana?" and his typical answer would be to echo back my question. So I model "yes peel the banana". We're still in this stage. He can answer readily if he wants to say NO, but for YES he still echos back or prances around on his toes laughing.

So model model model until you are talking to yourself in your sleep.

Thank you! I was just thinking about this yesterday because he is really starting to repeat phrases that I say. On Wed he crawled into my lap and said "DS come here" I was wondering if I should model what he should say but then I got to thinking that it might confuse him or something.

[Sierra]

One thing I would add, and I always hate to put this plug in there because I swear I talk about it too much (and yet I absolutely do not work for these folks nor have any other affiliation other than using it with my ds), would be to consider HANDLE neurodevelopmental therapy (www.handle.org). It might just help. It is one of the only therapies I know of that works on the brain level, from the ground up. Done faithfully on a daily basis under the guidance of a HANDLE practitioner, it has made a *big* difference in my ds' life, including in his cognition/reception/information processing of all types. He still has global delays, and language is still a challenge for him, but I do think this stuff has helped ease his experiences with the world a whole lot. This is something I really don't feel you'll ever get in ST.

[FancyD]

Originally Posted by faerierose

Repeat, repeat, pepeat, that's us too

That's pretty much it, along with keeping phrases really simple. If your child says 2-word sentences, use 3 words. No words, use one. That's what we've been told, anyway.

[krissi]

Receptive language was and still is a major issue for DD but there are things that good SLPs can do to help boost it. In addition to modeling, which I agree is extremely important, our old SLP worked on both the sound processing aspect but also some other things that I think she explained as giving DD an ability to categorize information she hears in her mind. She did a lot of stuff involving how to categorize pictures and visual aids to learning how to answer questions, such as building sentences by using picture icons to respond to other sentences that use picture icons, or offering visual aids of possible responses when asking questions.

There was this terrific game she'd play that was a kind of an association game where she'd write something down and say the word to DD, and then say "what goes with ___". If the SLP said "apples," then a correct answer from DD would be anything that was naturally associated with apples, like "eat," or "red," or "bananas" giving a strong benefit of doubt in any case where the association wasn't obvious (she'd later tell me about the response and I'd figure out where DD got the idea). Then the SLP would respond with a word that went with whatever DD said, like if she said "eat" the SLP would say "mouth." Then this game would go back and forth and be built up over time to be more complex. She had to model this game for a while but once DD caught on, she was so excited about being able to have a verbal interaction of some sort, that she was carrying around paper and pens and asking us to play it with her all day long sometimes for 45 minute stretches. The game seemed to build the ability to listen to what someone else said and process it in her mind to come back with something else. It could take her a full minute to come up with replies at times but the game really helped a LOT.

We're sort of working with this SLP long distance now that we've moved, since she was the only one we've seen who seemed to have a good clue about receptive language building tactics. She's strongly recommended a book called "Listen to This" by Linda Richman, and we're having good success with it (and the author has written a bunch of other books). There are also loads of terrific computer games to work on this by Super Duper Publications. DD's language is still impaired but instead of tiny baby steps over several months it feels like she's made a giant leap in the past year because of this SLP's strategy. (I almost wish we hadn't had to move. )