Ella is becoming much more verbal as time goes by. Her range of expression is expanding and her desire to speak and communicate in general is much increased.
However… her articulation and pronunciation is still very problematic. This is becoming more frustrating to me since she often now turns to me spontaneously and says something. I try to piece it together but often don’t understand what she is getting at. I employ all kinds of tricks like smiling, nodding and making approving sounds but that often won’t do. Especially when she is asking a direct question, and I am not sure what she is asking. Trying to narrow it down through questions is another tactic. But that often result in her going off on a tangent and me not knowing what the original question was.
So far, it doesn’t seem like she shares this frustration.
It is really nice to have her just comment on something out of the blue. Not as a response to a question as we are used to. For example a few days Netta had a melt down (not an infrequent occurrence), and went crying to the other room. Ella said ‘Netta is crying’ and then to Netta. ‘Netta. What happened?’
Or the other day, I was imitating something funny from the radio in the car. From behind me Ella suddenly announced ‘Etan. you is funny’. It is also encouraging to see that she is putting together more complex sentences.
Her vocabulary has grown dramatically. If you sit with her with a book and point to things in pictures she will be able to name nearly all of them.
As far as the pronunciation goes. It isn’t that she can’t do it, it is almost as if she doesn’t bother. For example her nanny is called ‘Mabel’. Ella consistently calls her ‘Nabel’, probably easier for her. But… if I work with her on this, by the third time she gets it right. We repeat and repeat and it seems like she has got it.
Then when we review the schedule (her absolute favorite activity now) she will say ‘and then… Nabel comes’.
Ella has become obsessed (nearly) with her schedule and with sequencing of things. Everything we do has a conversation about ‘and then…’. She wants to know what is going to happen after this. She has become quite good at it and if I tell her ‘today is Thursday, what happens today’, Ella will rattle off the whole days activity, morning to night and will even go to the next day. It is the first thing she is interested in every morning.
I find it quite encouraging.