Nine months ago I was hoping for a referral to Birth to Three for my youngest daughter for speech therapy. She was just 15 months old and not saying mama or dada yet. I got my referral and didn’t entirely expect she would get accepted. It was sort of if she does great, if she doesn’t they can give me pointers. It was a win win all around as far as I was concerned.
So we had the evaluation and she was accepted for speech. We immediately began her services and it has been great for her. She was apprehensive about it at first and the kid refuses to use sign language, but gradually over time she has been using her own gestures to get her point across.
She has been adding some approximations of words to her repertoire of stuff which has been great too, but also slightly frustrating because you really have to have an idea of what she’s trying to say in many instances to know what she’s saying. She leaves off the first letter of each word usually. So a lot of her words tend to sound alike. For instance, cat and hat both come out “at” which means we have to look at the situation to try to figure out if she’s saying hat or cat.
Then She Turned 2
She has only been 2 for a week and a half or so. But she has been busy. Right before her 2nd birthday we had to check on her goals for her IFSP (Individual Family Service Plan). We had to make new goals for her too.
So as we were going through them, most of the goals made for her in May she met. I think the only one she didn’t meet was the goal of copying sounds we make. This tends to be her way though. She’s not a fan of the copycat game. We couldn’t get her to sign no matter what we did. I can’t get her to repeat any sounds even if she says them first and I say them back to her.
It’s like if she realizes that you caught her doing something spontaneously she refuses to repeat that action for you. She’s either very stubborn or a perfectionist. It might be a combination of the both. But my feeling is if I say it enough she’ll just come out with it on her own. She always does. Just keep letting her hear it over and over again.
She Has New Goals
I talked to my daughter’s therapist about her goals. She’s very pleased with her progress. I asked her if she thinks if she were tested now if she would qualify. She’s not sure though, but I think she’s leaning towards no. But we don’t have to worry about any of that until May. Until then we do continue to get services.
So one of her new goals is trying to get her to put the beginning sounds on words. And along that we added some sounds we want to work on with her. The Ba, Ma, and Pa sounds all made the cut.
I wanted the Pa sound on there for sure because she does make that sound a lot spontaneously, but I can’t get her to put it on the beginning of words. Pop, comes out Op, but since Stop also comes out as Op I would like to see if we could change that. She’ll walk around whispering pa-pa-pa-pa-pa all over the house though so I knew this would be something we could get her to do.
And since Ba is similar in the mouth formation I knew that would be good to work on.
So today while my son was watching Little Einsteins on TV they were humming the “Adagio” song. They were saying Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba. My daughter was sitting next to me while I was on the computer and there was a picture of a baby on the screen. She was calling it E like she always does (I don’t know why baby doesn’t at least get the aby from her). And like always I kept correcting her and saying, “Yes, you see the baby? Baby, baby, baby!” Then she’d repeat, “E.”
Then I heard the singing on TV and it was going ba ba ba ba ba ba. So I repeated those ba’s from TV in a sing songy voice and then on the last ba I said baby. Do you know what she did? Clear as day she repeated, “Baby!” I was so excited! I tried again and she repeated me one more time before she got distracted by something else. But not only did I get her to repeat me, but it was clear and concise and she was saying BA.
I’m Blown Away By Her Progress
I really couldn’t be more thrilled that it seems she turns 2 and suddenly she’s really playing around with sounds and beginning to talk. And I know that in a few years I’m going to be wondering why did I push this, but right now it is the cutest thing EVA.
But it’s also making me a little worried. You all know I LOVE speech. Absolutely believe every single child can benefit from receiving speech therapy. Especially up and until they begin learning to read. Because all of that phonemic awareness kids work on just trying to get the sounds to speak them correctly is exactly how you learn to read. And I truly believe it’s a great lead in to reading.
So all the while my daughter is doing what she’s suppose to. She’s learning what she needs to learn and meeting goal after goal that has been set for her. And come May when it’s time to reevaluate all of this working towards goals could mean the end of her speech therapy.
Maybe I use it as too much of a crutch or expect too much out of speech therapy. I don’t think so though. The more people in my children’s lives helping them to learn the better.
I will take whatever I can get. I will enjoy every second of watching my daughter learn and grow and hope that she gets every single opportunity she deserves. Two seems to be a time for turning corners though.
Now off to see if I can get her to say baby again.
