16 month old's speech delay

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you everyone! You have all been so reassuring I'm not around other kids often, so I didn't realize that it's common for toddlers this age to struggle at fully pronouncing words.

I think DD's receptive language is very good. When I ask where her hair, nose, etc are she points to them. When I told DH I was going to feed her, she climbed into the glider where I nurse her. And if I ask her to hand me a ball or other object, she does.

Sorry I wasn't clear about the apple video. Lately I've been showing her the videos I've taken. There's one that gets her so excited she claps when she watches it, so I feel pretty sure that when she said "apple" she was asking me to play that one again. In this video, she's putting apples into the refrigerator, DH and I cheer her, and she raises her hands over her head in excitement.

Oh yeah op she sounds right on target!! I would not worry AT ALL. Her language will start exploding in the next six months to a year, it is so fun! She’s doing all the things you want to see.

[Anonymous]

Just want to add, like others have said all it means is she’s not an EARLY talker. And she wasn’t an EARLY walker. But the good thing is, when kids hit these milestones as long as they are within the range is not necessarily indicative of intellectual or physical abilities later in life. The kid that walked at 16 months may be just as physically capable or even more than the kid who walked at 11 months. The kid who was talking in sentences at 18 months may always be super smart and be an early reader, but a normal talker like your kid may be also. It’s really fun once you’re at 3-5 you see how they all really even right out by then they’re all walking and talking your ear off! Doesn’t really make a difference at that point whether they did it early or “late” unless the late is truly delayed and was information that there was something deeper going on.

[Anonymous]

Pediatric SLP here. It's sounds like your child is right on track. No worries if you can't understand her perfectly at this age. It's great that she's communicating with you and as long as she uses her approximations of words consistently you can count them as words.