On Monday, Ben had his "development evaluation". Two very nice girls came over to the house and we all talked and played for two hours. They basically confirmed my assumption: Ben is great and developing on or ahead of schedule in all of his other areas, but is a little behind his peer group when it comes to communication.
At that point, I was left with a decision: Do I give him more time to learn vocabulary as he normally would? Or do I bring in a Speech Therapist to work with him (and us) and see if that helps?
My decision was pretty easy, as we figure that working with a Speech Therapist definitely will not HURT. In fact, simply watching the way she interacted with Ben and the way she talked to and with him made me realize that there is a lot I can learn from her! She told us that while many kids pick up language simply by being around people talking, others sometimes need a little more focused attention to help them learn.
She recommended this book...
...which I immediately ordered and have read about 1/4 of already. It goes through all of the different communication stages, describes different styles of learning and different "parenting roles/styles" and how to match your style to the style your kid has. It's amazing how just by changing a few of the things we routinely do and allowing Ben to initiate communication has gotten him to talk more!
She suggested that we also take Ben to get his hearing tested to rule out any issues there. Based on the "sounds" he makes (consonant sounds and vowel sounds) she didn't think there was a problem, however, when I took him in on Wednesday to get tested - he had water in both of his ears. Since he just had double ear infections last month, the doctor thought that it's quite possible that this is residual from that, so we skipped the hearing test and are going back in 3 weeks to reassess. This could mean that Ben is not hearing sounds and speech as precisely as he could be - and whether this is temporary or if it might require a procedure to correct, it could explain where he is at speech wise!
In the mean time, he told me to have him blow bubbles as often as possible, as that can help to drain the fluid - a challenge that Ben is most certainly up for :)
And this week, in addition to his usual favorite words, we have heard:
Button
Bronson (Shauna heard it, I didn't....but she heard it twice so I'll go with it) :)
More - used and signed more than ever
Go - in reference to his cars
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