When my son turned two years old I started to realize that he was still not talking the way he should be, for his age, he should be at least saying a few word sentences, but still, he wasn’t and that’s not it, he wasn’t doing much interaction with us as well. Initially, we thought it was just normal behavior and would change over time but that didn’t happen. finally, we consulted a specialist who diagnosed him with a milder version of Autism spectrum disorder. at that time he had repetitive movements and wasn’t making much eye contact and responding to our commands occasionally. Post this we started his therapy and from that day to this day he has come a long way. with a few sessions of physiotherapy and occupational therapy he started following minor commands, talking a few words, and from then to now communicating his needs, expressing his accomplishments, and obeying commands, he has made a lot of progress.
Now the point of giving this background is twofold, first is that one should be able to recognize patterns that deviate from the norm among children, in India, particularly such behaviors are often ignored, or dealt with in a bad way, beating children, punishing them for not obeying, scolding them, when whats necessarily needed is to understand that the needs of this child are different, his way of communicating needs help, and yes help is available. And the earlier we get it the better for the child. Yes, we all expect that our child should be just like how we were or how our siblings were, but many times that’s not the case, to give you a number almost 1 in 100 children is autistic. now extrapolate this to a country like India and you’ll see the magnanimity of the issue. I’ll not call it a problem because it isn’t one, it’s just that some children are not going to follow the common path. they will need another and they will need some help along the way. Once we start thinking like that we can think of coming up with definitive solutions for the issue at hand. if one looks up the internet the world is filled with great people who have some or the other form of autism. thats why I say let’s not label it in a bad way. it’s just that some children are different, although this is just a simplistic way of saying you get the gist.
The second one is of the child not talking, now developing language skills is one of the important aspects of growing up. just as talking or eating or running is developing language is one of the necessities of life. So we expect our children to develop these skills automatically. we generally think well what’s the big deal in it. dont everyone else learn the language automatically? no one taught us our mother tongue but didn’t we learn it on our own?
One thing that I have realised is that these days there is a growing number of children who lack these skills. Now am not saying that all of them are autistic or that they need therapy or anything. language is but one aspect of growing up. but an important one nonetheless. Recently reading more about it I came to a realization that children don’t learn language automatically. Yes, they don’t, they learn from us.
Let me explain, the moment a child starts recognizing voice he or she starts associating the sound of it with things he/she sees are happening, or making basic correlations on what the sound means or who that sound is directed towards, who are making those sounds, etc etc. also they start recognizing the order of the sentences the grammar of it, although no one teaches them you must have observed that they speak sentences in proper grammerly manner. you must be thinking that since it’s all automatic what’s the issue here? why hasn’t my child started talking, everything else is fine with him but he/she isn’t speaking.
From my own experience I have come to a few realizations and these, mind you aren’t just my observations but are facts backed by scientific research. the first thing to note is who is the child’s first teacher? the answer to them will come naturally as parents, right. Yes, that’s correct, but in the modern scenario these first teachers are not doing their job properly. you may ask why? the simple answer is our addiction to cell phones electronic devices and social media. Parents are not interacting with themselves. A recent report published in Forbes points out that Indians spent one-third of their waking hours using their mobile. so suppose you are awake for 16 hours you are spending almost 5 hours on your mobile phone. we are just not talking with each other. imagine spending one-third of your waking hours on your phone then you have work then you have to take care of daily necessities like taking a bath, eating food, do exercising, in all this schedule when is it that you are interacting you your partner. We are just having transactional conversations, say give me food, where is my wallet, did you do this or that? what time is it now?, there is no meaningful discussion left, or for that matter even the meaningless banter or the jokes or the give and take of few sentences. and who is watching all this? your child, that little fellow lying on his/her bed is seeing that people aren’t interacting, so in his tiny brain that’s getting registered as normal behavior, he sees you watching a mobile he gravitates towards it. these days I see people boasting that their child knows how to open YouTube and play his favourite video or unlock the phone etc and he/she isn’t able to talk 4 proper sentences. And I am no different I did the same. why I am writing this is because if even a single person reads this he/she doesn’t make the mistake I did. Not talking to your partner not only affects the language skills of your child but it also hampers the relationship you hold with your partner. Time and again here things like my partner doesnt talk to me, he/she doesnt pay attention to me. he/she is always engrossed in the phone.
much of the vocabulary a child develops is from listening to what being said around him, what he hears, what he sees, how he/she makes an association with what be said, and what response the said words invoke. all these play an importnat role in language development of the child.
Now some of you might say, well even my parents didn’t talk much, that didn’t affect my language skills so why is it affecting my children. there shouldnt be a valid reason for this. But the simple answer to that is how our society has changed. Previous generations used to live in a joint family. A joint family means a larger number of people, larger number of people mean more interactions, so even though the parents were not interacting, the mother was talking to her mother in law, who was talking to her husband, uncle and unties talking in front of the kids, their kids talking playing around, there was no shortage of teache for the child to learn from. secondly, people used to live in small societies, there was no gatekeeping. I vividly remember that during my childhood the front door was never closed or locked. the neighbors used to come over anytime, there used to be different kinds of vendors coming at the door, every morning a pauwala used to come screaming at the top of his voice for us to indicate that he had arrived, children of neighbors used to visit. Nowadays that all has vanished.
With the ever-growing nuclear family norm the number of teachers for the child has reduced, and those that are there aren’t doing their job properly. i know this may be a tough pill to swallow. a husband might feel that he’s working his ass off to feed his family to provide them with the best that is available a mother might feel that she’s giving her all, she’s sacrificing everything for the child but still it’s not bearing fruits. But the truth is raising a child is a job both partners need to do. a mother or a father can interact with the child but what they interact with is childplay. what the child needs to learn and imbibe is more. The source whom he learns that from is obviously his parents. so if you aren’t talking with your partner more make a point that you start doing that. it’s not that a miracle will happen all of a sudden and your child will just start talking suddenly but over some time he/she will. and it’s not just that, it will improve your relationship with your partner as well.
Another thing that many times we ignore is that if the child is not looking at us why should we talk why read him a book or why say stuff directed at it. this is another hindrance that can affect the child’s language development skills. one study done in the United States observed that when children were read a book aloud when they were not looking at the reader, the researchers observed that just listening to the story not only activated the area of brain related to listening but also the one related to visualization, basically maening that the children were not just listening but were also trying to make the association of what was said. so it’s also important that you engage in such activities even if you feel that the child isn’t listening to you or is engaged is some other activity. A childs brain is a much more active machine than a adults. and their learning power is even better. so maybe we should also not underestimate them.
Another important aspect we often forget these days is what is stressing on the words we want the children to pay attention to, stressing on them changing the pitch or loudness when we say those words helps attract the attention of the kids to those words. It helps kids make more sense of the word spoken, understand it, and try to make its use afterward. But all said and done what is really important is for you to have communication with the kids. Not any phone or tv or any other device is going to help him learn the language as your interaction with him/her. so talk to them make them listen to you, and if it’s still not working seek help, just like we did. there is no shame in reaching out to help, we are doing it out of love and for the betterment of our kids, after all, if not us then who is going to hold their hand. show them love talk to them and you’ll see how they react and reach back at you.
crashingstone 