As your child grows from an infant to a toddler to an older child, there are many ways in which he or she develops. These include physical, cognitive, and speech development.

Every child develops at different rates and some children develop in certain areas faster than others. Speech and language are the most common areas of development that can be delayed.

As about 20% of children learn to talk or use words later than other children their age, it might be difficult for parents to correctly spot speech delay issues with their child.

In this article, we'll investigate more about speech delay for your children and where to find the best speech delay therapy in Malaysia.

How Can I Tell If My Child Has a Speech or Language Delay?

While every child develops in his or her unique timeline, there are speech and language milestones that most children will reach at certain ages. Your pediatrician will talk with you about these milestones during well-child checkups. Examples of these milestones for speech and language are:

• By 1 year of age, most babies will:
• Wave goodbye
• Say papa or mama
• Between 1 and 2 years of age, most toddlers will:
• Name a few common objects and pictures when asked
• Point to a few body parts when asked
• By 2 years of age, most toddlers will:
• Say several 2-word phrases, such as “no more”
• Be able to follow a 1-step command, such as “put your cup on the table”

If your child is delayed in several areas, this may be a sign of speech or language delay.

What Causes Speech or Language Delays?

Simple speech delays are sometimes temporary. They may go away on their own or with some extra help. 

In some cases, delays in speech may be a sign of a more serious problem, such as hearing loss, learning problems, developmental delays in other areas, or autism spectrum disorder.

How Does Speech Delay Treatment Work?

Step 1 - Assessment

Every child should start their therapy journey with an assessment. This allows the therapists to identify your child’s strengths and weaknesses and establish a baseline to compare their progress to during therapy.

During the assessment, verbal communication, number and types of words, and sounds your child may be using will be reviewed. 

Next, therapists should provide you with a therapy management plan to identify key goals to focus on in the therapy program.

Step 2- Therapy

In speech therapy for children, therapists will support your child to enrich their day-to-day language environment and maximise ways to model and stimulate speech and language.

Here's a quick example of how speech therapy treatment for children will look like:

• For children with only single words, therapists may look to increase the number of action words (verbs) so they can be joined with naming words to create the beginnings of short phrases
• Expanding the range of vocabulary – to increase the variety of words through child-directed play
• Increasing understanding (comprehension) of language through book reading and play strategies
• Helping resolve any potential hearing problems

Speech therapy treatment will also help you become confident to easily incorporate language boosting strategies into your child's daily activities. 

What Can Parents Do For Their Children At Home?

• Practice - if your child has trouble saying a certain sound "f" for example encourage him or her to just make that sound all by itself. Once that comes more easily you can incorporate it into syllables like "fi-fi-fi" or "fa-fa-fa" before moving onto actual words that use it.

• Focus on what your child can do - it's important to pay attention to improvements in speech remember to praise other small victories like picking up toys being polite or using the bathroom.

• Keep background noise and distractions to a minimum - during learning sessions, too much TV can actually delay language development because parents tend not to talk as much to their children as they otherwise would. This is due to the fact that children learn to speak best when they are actually spoken to.

• Read - reading a favorite book to your child and then having them read it back to you can provide excellent reinforcement. Even if the child is too young to be able to read words, having them explain what they see in the book and remembering the context from hearing it can strengthen speech and confidence.



Choose Well Rehab as your trusted speech delay therapy centre in Malaysia

Ensuring your child's language skills improve with therapy drives all of us at Well Rehab.

As Malaysia's leading provider of speech delay therapy for children, we are the preferred, qualified and certified professionals that are trusted nationwide.

For more information about our therapies or services in Malaysia, you may contact us at +60 12 512 8487 or email wellrehabmanagement@gmail.com