Expert: Nancy Brough, MA, former speech pathologist - 7/2/2009

Question
My son is 4  years old (no hearing loss)and he still has the communication skills of a 2 year old (who just started to learn how to talk). he can't articulate waht he wants to say in sentence forms and often responds with one word answers. 60% of the time he doesn't really understand the questions. We have tried socializing him wiht kids his age who have much better communciation skills and even tried to teach him at home as much as possible-a lot of vocablaries, nothing is working-any other ideas would be appreciated.


Answer
It's time for your son to have a speech pathology evaluation and therapy by a qualified speech pathologist.
From your description, your boy most likely has a language processing disorder; perhaps "Central Auditory Processing Disorder" (CAPD"). That means he doesn't break down what he hears into meaningful units of language. "Central" means the problem is in the brain and not in the ears (if it was actually a hearing problem, it would be referred to as "peripheral", rather than "central").
While children with simple language/speech delay are helped by socialization whith children who have normal speech and language development, CAPD is helped very little by such intervention. The same is true of trying to teach vocabulary.
Therapy for CAPD goes all the way back to learning to distinguish between and among speech sounds, starting with the vowels and dipthongs, then on to sounds in the normal progression in phonemic development (m,n,ng,p,b are the first few). A qualified speech pathologist knows how to direct a child through therapy in the right progression. She or he knows how to keep a child motivated at his exact developmental stage, and has the knowledge of how to teach the child to compensate for his deficits.
Trying to "drill" a child below the developmental age of 7yrs (your son is at the language age of 2 years) is highly counterproductive and is strongly discouraged by professionals who work with children like your son. Children learn much better in an environment of professionally directed play that is very structured.
I do know that therapy is available in Saudi Arabia. The teaching hospital in Jeddah is a good place to start your inquries into finding a speech pathologist closer to home.
I hope that helps. Please feel free to ask additional questions!
Good luck and best wishes,
Nancy