Isn't this a bit of a high expectation?

emmared1986 · January 2011

At G's 15 month appointment today the pedi wanted him to be saying 20+ words. She didn't count his animal noises (moo, quack) or his signs (he does about 10). She wanted him to be able to say 'thank you' not just sign it. She also wouldn't count his word 'lala' which means Elmo.

I just thought 20 was a lot of words for a 15 month old. He understands a lot but I couldn't hit 20 words with all of her 'restrictions'.

Jocelyn0415 · January 2011

Uh...yeah, that seems high. Evie's pedi said 4 words at 18 months and I thought that was really low. She says about 12 words now.

oboechick7 · January 2011

that sounds like a lot to me. Our pedi only wanted 8, and he counted animal sounds

tarebear9891 · January 2011

That is crazy. He is perfectly normal (even a little better than normal for his age). Our pedi said 5 words at 15 months was normal.

P.S. just wanted to say my DS still calls Elmo "lala"!

woolgathered · January 2011

I would really think signing would be included! It is considered an actual language, after all. It's just not English.

FlaCourtney · January 2011

Very high. My ped asked for about four words. I'm still not sure we've hit 20 words, although he understands a ton.

lilitaliangirl · January 2011

Well crap. If that's the case we are going to be $crewed. Bear just said "da-da" (to dada) for the first time yesterday! We've only got 3 months to get 19 more words in!

rebeccaontherocks · January 2011

at our 15 month appt, our pedi said he should be saying between 3-5 words and sounds DID count. For instance:

my ds says:

Bah = Ball
Booh = Book
Da Di = Daddy
ehlo = Hello
Ah Dee = All Done

And the Pedi was very happy with all that

mechanicsgirl · January 2011

That seems really high. My pedi usually has pretty high expectations and asked for 5-8 words.

Scooter359 · January 2011

Wow. Mason is only saying mama,dada and baba, with a bunch of random ramblings thrown in there and our pedi said the norm for his age is around five words and mama,dada,baba count. She didn't seem concerned yet, I would say he is doing very well for his age.

sasa625 · January 2011

I'm a speech therapist... first of all, 20 words is a pretty high expectation for a 15 month old. Great if your child has that many, but nothing to worry about if they he doesn't!! Also, animal noises definitely count, and I would be impressed with 10 signs (my own daughter only knew 2 at that point and only knows 4 now ) And a word includes anything a child says consistently to mean the same thing (meaning "lala" is a word for your child!!) And good job that he signs "thank you!" I'm pretty sure that's more than a lot of 15 month olds could do. I would definitely not be worried at all that he can't use the actual words!

Sounds like hs'e doing fine, since from your post I see 3 words!! It frustrates me when pediatricians don't have a good grasp of language development!

jason&robin · January 2011

that is a lot. At 15 months, I think mama and dadda and a few other words is normal. They usually have about 250 words by 2 years so there is a huge explosion. Both my kids have been in speech therapy because they have so few words so I am not used to having kids that speak so quickly.

emmared1986 · January 2011

sasa625:

I'm a speech therapist... first of all, 20 words is a pretty high expectation for a 15 month old. Great if your child has that many, but nothing to worry about if they he doesn't!! Also, animal noises definitely count, and I would be impressed with 10 signs (my own daughter only knew 2 at that point and only knows 4 now ) And a word includes anything a child says consistently to mean the same thing (meaning "lala" is a word for your child!!) And good job that he signs "thank you!" I'm pretty sure that's more than a lot of 15 month olds could do. I would definitely not be worried at all that he can't use the actual words!

Sounds like hs'e doing fine, since from your post I see 3 words!! It frustrates me when pediatricians don't have a good grasp of language development!

Thank you!

only1erin · January 2011

we went to our 1 year appt last friday and our pedi said at our next appt ( 1 1/2 year) he wanted ds to be at 5 words.

rebus82 · January 2011

That seems ridiculous. At B's 18-month appt. the pedi just said "he's saying at least few words, right?" and when we said he was saying more than that he said that was great.

I don't see why she wouldn't count signs or identifier noises. And two-word phrases are not a normal expectation of a 15-month old to my knowledge. Certainly not from our doctor.

Is she a fairly young doctor? Our doctor has been in practice for quite a while and he seems pretty happy to use the watch and wait approach for most milestones. As long as B is constantly improving his skills and isn't reverting then he's on-track as far as our pedi is concerned.

MrsJMB · January 2011

20 words seems super ridiculous to me. I mean, sure some kids have 20 words, but for it to be an expectation from the pedi I think is just ridiculous.

dmogmo · January 2011

My kid probably won't be able to do that at 2. That's crazy IMO.

rigbyroosky · January 2011

At DD's 18 month appointment the dr wanted 10-20 words but she counted just about everything DD attempted as a word. Not counting animal sounds seems a bit ridiculous to me.

robynlesley · January 2011

I think it's high too. When my DS had his 15 month visit, he was saying more than 20 words but about half of them were "Moo" for cow, "Baa" for sheep and, like your DS, "Lala" for Elmo.

Every pedi seems to have different markers for this. While A is quite verbal, he's not saying thank you or many two word phrase besides "Ah dun" (all done) and I didn't even think he SHOULD now.

emberlee3 · January 2011

DS was only saying 5 words at 15 months and our pedi said it was normal.

Assembly_Reqd · January 2011

There is a language inventory checklist called MacArthur-Bates that Nate is being evaluated with. Animal sounds are counted.....20 seems like too many...