Speech and Language Delay

Pooja Mundada

What is it?

  • It is a developmental issue where the child lags behind the typical speech and language milestones. It impacts child’s ability to produce words and use language to communicate effectively

Key Features

  • Child’s speaking skills or expressive language skills may not be age-appropriate
  • In some cases both understanding and speaking is affected
  • It can be associated with cognitive difficulties, autism or other developmental difficulties
  • It is caused due to family or birth issue related factors

Characteristics

  • No babbling by the age of 6-9 months
  • Reduced use of consonants and only using vowels while babbling
  • Limited vocabulary than peers of same age
  • Not speaking in 3 words sentences by 3 years of age
  • Difficulty combining words into sentences  
  • Shows frustration due to difficulty in communicating
  • Limited social interaction or likes to play alone

Treatment

  • Speech language therapist works with children to improve their language skills using play therapy and various techniques.
  • Parents are involved in the process to learn strategies which will help in generalising the language skills to different environment

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