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My DS is 17 months old, and has no words yet. Sounds, yes, but no words. He uses a bit of sign, though not a lot. He points to what he wants or will take my hand and lead me to what he wants, then point. He knows a few different animal sounds, and a couple of body parts (nose, mouth, tummy, toes). He's also great with his receptive language...I can tell him it's time to change his diaper and he runs for his room, time for lunch and he runs to the kitchen, time to go bye-bye and he gets his coat and brings it to me, etc.
Anyway, at his 15 mo WBV his ped was concerned about his lack of words and referred him to EI, which I was fine with. Here at least EI for birth to 3 is just people that come into your home or meet you somewhere, play with your child for a while with different toys, etc. Gives the child new experiences, new stuff to focus on...the idea is to give them stimulating things to WANT to talk about, assuming the child's hearing is fine (which DS' is). I don't see an issue with this - DS loves new people and new experiences, and the service is free because of our income level, so no biggie.
Except that I met the speech lady the other day for the first time when she came to evaluate DS and I REALLY don't like her. DS was having a very quiet day, plus they could only squeeze him in literally RIGHT before nap time, so he was tired anyway. She acted so frustrated that he wouldn't do anything for her. She'd get out a bunch of plastic fruit and then ask DS to hand her the apple (or orange, or whatever), and then give him precisely .01 seconds to do it while he was happily immersing himself in all the toys she'd brought. Then she'd mark something down on her chart and whisk away all the things he was looking at and dig something else out and do it all over.
When she got done she made no pretense out of telling me that DS' speech development is in the 6-9 month range. I told her I didn't believe her because I'd never seen a 9 month old that could identify the rooms in his/her house, go to them when asked, as well as identify body parts, make animal sounds, etc. I DO agree that DS is slightly delayed in his speech development, but not by that far. She kind of shrugged her shoulders and kept repeating that he's at 6-9 months.
The early childhood specialist who also saw him to evaluate him on other levels of development puts him at 18-21 months and says he's obviously very bright, very sweet, social, happy, etc. So in her opinion it's just his speech that is an issue right now, although her opinion is that he's still very young and that given his intelligence and other development, that the speech will pretty much just take off one day and go, that because I SAH with him and his needs are always met he's hasn't had much need to learn to speak.
I know this is getting super long, so I apologize, but I guess my question is given my dislike for the speech therapist, and given DS' development in other areas, should I just let them know I want to discontinue EI for the time being and let DS be? See what happens by the time he turns 2? Or, do I need to address his delay now and tolerate the speech lady? What have been your experiences with your kiddos?
Anyway, at his 15 mo WBV his ped was concerned about his lack of words and referred him to EI, which I was fine with. Here at least EI for birth to 3 is just people that come into your home or meet you somewhere, play with your child for a while with different toys, etc. Gives the child new experiences, new stuff to focus on...the idea is to give them stimulating things to WANT to talk about, assuming the child's hearing is fine (which DS' is). I don't see an issue with this - DS loves new people and new experiences, and the service is free because of our income level, so no biggie.
Except that I met the speech lady the other day for the first time when she came to evaluate DS and I REALLY don't like her. DS was having a very quiet day, plus they could only squeeze him in literally RIGHT before nap time, so he was tired anyway. She acted so frustrated that he wouldn't do anything for her. She'd get out a bunch of plastic fruit and then ask DS to hand her the apple (or orange, or whatever), and then give him precisely .01 seconds to do it while he was happily immersing himself in all the toys she'd brought. Then she'd mark something down on her chart and whisk away all the things he was looking at and dig something else out and do it all over.
When she got done she made no pretense out of telling me that DS' speech development is in the 6-9 month range. I told her I didn't believe her because I'd never seen a 9 month old that could identify the rooms in his/her house, go to them when asked, as well as identify body parts, make animal sounds, etc. I DO agree that DS is slightly delayed in his speech development, but not by that far. She kind of shrugged her shoulders and kept repeating that he's at 6-9 months.
The early childhood specialist who also saw him to evaluate him on other levels of development puts him at 18-21 months and says he's obviously very bright, very sweet, social, happy, etc. So in her opinion it's just his speech that is an issue right now, although her opinion is that he's still very young and that given his intelligence and other development, that the speech will pretty much just take off one day and go, that because I SAH with him and his needs are always met he's hasn't had much need to learn to speak.
I know this is getting super long, so I apologize, but I guess my question is given my dislike for the speech therapist, and given DS' development in other areas, should I just let them know I want to discontinue EI for the time being and let DS be? See what happens by the time he turns 2? Or, do I need to address his delay now and tolerate the speech lady? What have been your experiences with your kiddos?
