Is Your Child's Language Developing Correctly?

Parents rejoice at watching their child grow and get bigger, and eagerly await their first words. But after the child utters their first words, doubts may arise as to whether their language is growing and developing properly?

The early stages of a child's life are among the most important in their life, during which the child develops linguistically to a great extent (from the age of 8 months to 3 years). In their first months, they begin babbling, making sounds, and interacting with whoever speaks to them through movement or attention. At the age of 10 months up to one year, they begin trying to utter their first words (Mama - Papa - Nana) even if they do not comprehend their meaning. Their language skills continue to develop gradually until they reach the age of three, which is the stage of speech takeoff using pronouns, tenses, and complex sentence structures. Learn here in detail about the stages of a child's language development.

Language development varies from one child to another; however, a child's delay in any of the previous stages may be an indicator of the potential presence of language disorders. Indicators of language delay appear in a child early, but 76% of parents do not realize the existence of a language problem in their child until late. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association stated after a study it conducted that 8% of children suffer from language delay problems, and that language disorders are the most common and least detected in the early stage.

In Saudi Arabia, there is no systematic information on the prevalence of language disorders among children, but it appears that diagnosis is always late, and consequently, children do not receive the required support.

And we cannot blame them for that; a child suffering from language delay does not suffer from a problem with speech or hearing, but rather suffers from a problem with their understanding of language, or their use of it, or both.

Signs of language delay include having difficulty with:

• Understanding what people say
• Following directions
• Participating in conversations
• Telling a story or event sequentially
• Staying on the same topic
• Acquiring new words
• Forming sentences
• Using the correct verb tense

It has been observed that these children are more vulnerable to social, emotional, behavioral, and cognitive problems, and the consequences of language delay appear in them as:

• Behavioral problems
• Not making friends
• Isolation
• Difficulties in reading and writing
• Poor academic achievement
• Dropping out of school
• Psychological disorders
• General health problems, and their healthcare costs at 4–5 years are higher than their peers in the same age group

These problems may appear from childhood, but they may affect them more significantly in adolescence and adulthood.

Since language is one of the most important capacities for communication and for expressing and understanding emotions, how do we ensure the level of development of our children's language skills? Are they on the right track, or are they suffering from language delay?

Some parents see signs of language delay in their children but follow the incorrect "wait and see" policy, which causes the easiest and most beneficial early intervention stage to be missed. They wait until the child passes three years of age, which complicates language problems further and requires greater effort from parents. This may be because scales in the past

required specialists, laboratories, longer time, and higher cost.

But now, modern methods have been developed that enable parents to conduct an initial screening of their child's language skills themselves without the need to visit a clinic, using reliable and effective methods, including the Ynmo Family app which contains the JISH Arabic Inventory for Language Development.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNevk4v9IgI&t=2s

JISH Arabic Language Development Inventory

The research team at Jeddah Institute for Speech and Hearing and Medical Rehabilitation (JISH) worked on studying the MacArthur Language Development Inventory, which is considered an effective and highly credible tool for measuring children's language, and has been translated and standardized into many world languages (such as Spanish, German, French, Chinese, Japanese, Swedish, and others), proving its effectiveness in all these environments. The team also worked on designing the JISH Arabic Language Development Inventory according to the methods used by MacArthur in his inventory, and it was adapted into Arabic and standardized in line with the terminology and rules of Arabic grammar and morphology. The scale is an initial screening tool for language disorders in children starting from 8 months of age, and an electronic version of it was developed on the Ynmo Plan app so that parents can complete it from anywhere.

It measures the child's language across several aspects, and shows them the mastery percentage of each aspect classified as: Typical - Borderline Delayed - Delayed, with a detailed report comparing the child's language skill level with peers of the same age. Then, you can book a consultation session with a specialist to discuss the screening results.

The scale has two inventories:

• JISH Arabic Language Development Inventory / Words and Gestures (Signs)

It is for children from 8 to 16 months of age, and consists of:

Questions aimed at finding out whether the child has begun responding to language or not
Questions aimed at finding out the extent of the child's imitation and use of words
28 simple sentences where parents determine whether the child understands them or not
Through the inventory, specific scores can be obtained for vocabulary comprehension (words the child understands), verbal vocabulary use (words the child says and uses), and the child's use of symbolic communicative gestures (such as expressing emotions through facial expressions).

Note: Nonverbal gestures are very important and play a major role in infants' early communication skills, and are considered the cornerstone of language development.

• JISH Arabic Language Development Inventory / Words and Sentences

It is for children from 16 months to 3 years of age, and consists of:

Part One: 898 verbal vocabulary words divided across 21 semantic categories.
Ten of these categories are dedicated to nouns (animals, toys, foods...), and among the remaining categories: verbs, adjectives, time... and others
The vocabulary section is followed by five questions regarding the extent of the child's use of words expressing the past and future, and words expressing absent events and people.

Note: It was found that this development in language regarding the use of place and time usually begins late in the single-word stage of language development (Ingram, 1981)

Part Two: Screening and evaluating the child's skills in using grammatical rules related to syntax and morphology units.

Part Two contains five sections, the first three of which assess the child's use of different word forms (such as pronouns, plural, masculine and feminine...), a section of choices for sentences children use, and the final section asks parents to write down three of the longest sentences the child recently used, which is the only item containing qualitative open-ended questions.

Both inventories can also be used to evaluate older children who have speech delays.

Where do I find the JISH Language Development Inventory and how can I use it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnpUMDui7YQ

1- Download the Ynmo Plan app from

Google Play

App Store

2- Create an account

3- Go to available assessments and select Language Development Measurement (Short Form)

4- Tap on Add a New Child

5- Take the test and submit the answers

6- The result appears immediately

Note: You can take the test across several sessions by clicking "Save and complete later"

Parents are the best evaluators of their child's language skill development, so do not hesitate to take the step of measuring their communication and language skills through the Ynmo app from here 

to give them a better chance to connect with the world around them, a chance for a better ability to express feelings and desires, a chance for a higher educational level, to give them a chance to acquire sound language that builds a better future.

Join us on the hashtag #WithEarlyScreeningWeGiveThemAChance on Twitter

Originally published in Arabic. This English version was produced with AI-assisted translation; the Arabic original remains the reference.