With Mr N's quarterly review coming up we are studiously trying to record all of his words. His goal for this quarter is 50 words. I started recording them Tuesday, he is up to 44. I'd really like him to meet this goal. Since I've been keeping track, I've noticed that he is doing a lot more echolalia. It's hard to know what is good, what is bad, and what should be encouraged versus discouraged. While reading "Thinking in Pictures" by Temple Grandin I came across her opinion on echolalia. She indicated that children do echolalia to practice saying the word and to hear what it sounds like coming out of their mouth.
I've quite decided that I will not discourage echolalia. I've noticed the more Mr N does it the better he gets at pronouncing words correctly.
Yesterday Mr N did pretty good during therapy. He did do receptive color matching, but I don't feel like he really understands that red is red. I think we have a lot more work ahead of us to get to where I'm comfortable saying he knows his colors. I'm confident he can distinguish between colors, he can color sort them quite easily, but I don't think he understands that each of them have a different name and which is which.
I'm sure it is human nature, or at least maternal instincts that make me want to get the training and education to be able to teach him everything, to understand how to train him to speak, and fulfill his sensory needs. It is so bothersome that I don't have the skills needed to teach him everything. It is so frustrating that he talks and I can encourage him to talk, but how do I correct his manner of speech?
Sometimes I start to get hopeful when I tell people that Mr N's speech is at about a 12-13 month old level and they assure me that their child who is 18-24 months doesn't talk as well as Mr N. I start to think, wow maybe he is really catching up, then I spend a few minutes with Mr N and back to reality, he is quite legitametly at the 12-13 month old level in speech. I never know if I should tell people that they should have their child's speech evaluated when they say Mr N speaks better or just let it be. Talking to my sister-in-law who has a 2 year old always assures me that Mr N is, in fact, delayed. My niece always wants to talk to me, hearing her sweet little voice say "hi auntie, how are you?" is really all I need. Her speech and vocabulary is expanding on track and quite rapidly much like E's did at that age. Oh how I wish Mr N would increase his vocabulary as rapidly as my niece, how I wish he spoke as well, with as much inflection and enunciated as well, but alas, this battle is mine, we will conquer this delay.
Yesterday after therapy ended we loaded the car and headed south, Daddy has a meeting today in Irvine so we made the drive down with him, for a little change in routine. The trip down was relaxing, it gave Daddy and I a chance to talk and spend some time together. We got checked into our hote,l and let me just say, this is the coolest hotel room I've ever stayed in. It is quite large and has a nice size sitting area, office area, plus a spacious sleeping area with a split bath and walk in closet, it is complete with a microwave, fridge and storage space for our food. The airport is quite close by so the kids have enjoyed watching arrivals as they descend towards the hotel.
This morning Daddy headed to work, while the kids and I scouted out the nearest Target to obtain drinks, snacks and some much needed long sleeve shirts for E. I'm not sure how I failed to purchase her warmer clothes prior to now, but I did. We have a chance for snow in the forecast at home, so we need to be prepared with warm clothes!
Of course, since we don't have TV at home the kids think staying in a hotel is the bees knees since they get to watch TV shows that they have never seen before. We also had the opportunity to see a rare taxi this morning, E was quite impressed at the sight of the taxi and announced quite excitedly "look! there is a taxi! I didn't know we had taxis here....here on planet earth!". Indeed we do, indeed we do.
Tomorrow we head back home, we intend to stop and visit my cousin on our way through her town.
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