Some Speech
The speech therapy with TwinkleToes is starting to show some progress. No one can understand her but us, and often I wouldn’t know what she was saying if she wasn’t using the sign language as she said the word, but she is starting to try to talk, and in some cases is successful enough that we know what she means.
The most exciting development is that she can now refer to her sister with language. GlitterGirl is now called ZZ (or, for the Canadians, maybe I should say ZeeZee). That’s close enough to “sissy” in my book. The Z isn’t really a Z, either, it’s a sound we don’t have in the English language. But it’s closer to Z than anything else. When I hear “maMA ZZ” it means she is tattling on sissy about something.
For most things she just says the vowel sound, though there are a few consonant sounds she has now (like M and D and B). She says Baaaaa for Ball, and aaaamo (same ah sound) for Elmo. She can not say either of the e sounds, neither the long or short e unless she is meowing, when she does the long e sound perfectly.
She’s got a whole litany of animal sounds she can do – besides meow she also barks and growls and moos and kind of quacks and neighs and has the most adorable piggy snort.
When she signs more she says “ma”, when she signs up she says “uh”, when she signs down she says “da”, when she signs please she says “be”, when she signs cat she meows, when she signs dog she barks.
She’s still a ways from talking, but her voice is oh-so-sweet to hear.
August 11th, 2007 at 7:22 am
It’s great to hear how well she’s doing. Each step forward is big. Reading this has again confirmed that I’ll want to sign with my daughter when she comes home. I recently met a bloggy friend who signs with her daughter and it was wonderful to watch. They communicated more easily and very quickly I could read her signs too and realize what she wanted.
It must be a wonderful treat to hear your daughters voice beginning to form words that you can understand!
Cute comment about us Canadians! :o) I’m really not sure how we ended up with ‘zed’ at then end of our alphabet. What’s up with that….eh? LOL!
August 12th, 2007 at 8:45 pm
RQ-
I like what I read. She is developing speech. Don’t worry about deleted sounds right now. Just repeat back to her and model using appropriate language. Your therapist probably told you but so others know- Try very hard not to do the “say ___” that comes so naturally to us as parents. That is a memory drill, not articulation modelling. Just repeat back in natural context. For instance, if a baby says “da” for ‘down’ parent can say, “DOWNNNN? Ok. DOWNNNNN! wheeeee! DOWNNNN!”
Ok, I’ll stop now. I am most excited that she is putting two together in a very emotionally charged moment (telling on sister)! That is great!
SIS
aka Hattie’s mom