Communication

Just now Penny and I were really bored. Shamus and Rory were gone to Rory’s swimming lesson and I had no idea what to do with my afternoon – so I transcribed everything Penny said to me in half an hour. (The bold are things either I said out loud or what she typed, and the rest is just the hilariousness that she talks about regularly.)

penny hewitt is five years old. old. juij. i want zombie school. no swimming. swimming. swimming swimming. swimming swimming swimming swimming. swimming swimming swimming swimming swimming swimming swimming. works. work. works. work. cup. cup. i like to eat apples and bananas. nope! nope! nope! ringing sunday. monday. yoga. noooo. tuesday. wednesday. thursday. friday. saturday. sunday. monday. tuesday. wednesday. thursday. friday. saturday. sunday. monday. tuesday. wednesday. Thursday. I’m a duck. Friday. saturday. math. yes. yes. yes yes. yes yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. go. go! = nope! i’m so! swimming.  no swimming. swim. my favourite food is pop tarts. a. pop tart. pop tarts. i want rory. penny. rory. mommy. daddy. yeah! yep! yes! oh. ha. yet! ew yet! ohhhh noooo! have emma, simon, anthony, lachy, dorothy the dinosaur, wags the dog, henry the octopus, captain feathersword! emma, simon, anthony’s in the wiggle house. emma how wiggle! simon! wiggle. anthony! wiggle. lachy! wiggle. dorothy the dinosaur! wiggle. wags the dog! wiggle. henry the octopus! wiggle. henry the octopus! wiggle. captain feathersword! one. miss polly had a dolly. wake up, lachy! lachy. shark. shell. shimmy shake! shark. snuck the wiggles two the wiggles to me to me! snuck. dorothy. a. emma. m. ant. bear. crocodile. duck. echidna. flamingo. gorilla. horse. impala. jaguar. koala. ladybug. mouse. numbat. ostrich. pig. quetzal. rooster. skunk. tiger. underwater the animals. vulture. whale. fox. yabby. zebu. alligator. butterfly. crocodile. cow! dog. elephant. frog. goat. hippo. iguana. jellyfish. kangaroo. lion. monkey. narwhal. octopus. panda. quokka. rabbit. snake. turtle. umbrella bird. vole. wolf. x-ray fish. yak! zebra. astronaut. ballerina. conductor. doctor. engineer. firefighter. gardener. hairdresser. illustrator. jockey. karate instructor. librarian. musician. nurse. optometrist. pilot. queen. race car driver. scientist. teacher. umpire. vet. writer. x-ray technician. yoga instructor. zookeeper. antlers. bells. candy cane. decorations. elf. frosty the snowman. grinch. ho ho ho. invitation.

It was just a random activity to encourage Penny to talk, read and spell, and I don’t know if you got through all that rambling, but it got me to thinking about “verbal” vs “non-verbal”. I really struggle with how to define the kids’ verbal status in a way that people will understand.

I call Rory “pre-verbal” (although he could technically be considered verbal). He says some words, which is increasing daily, and it’s often functional. Like, he’ll fill in the words for songs or he’ll label his car as “orange car”, “brown car” etc. If you put on a jacket, he’ll say “jacket”. It’s usually related to what is happening around him. Can you ask him a question that he’ll answer? No. Will he hear you ask if he wants to go for a drive and then repeat the word “drive” ten thousand times while getting his boots on? Yes.

Penny can say a lot, as seen above, but I hesitate to actually call her verbal without explanation because it’s mostly Echolalia (verbal imitation). For the longest time we thought she would never talk but she rarely shuts up now. I can’t say it’s not functional, because it’s her way of communicating, but it’s not conversational. She can’t tell me about her day. She won’t answer my questions. She sometimes will answer a yes or no question, but we usually have to ask her specifically “yes or no?” and make the question as simple as possible. She largely talks in reference to her favourite shows and Youtube videos. She gets fixated on things being in alphabetical order. (She loves patterns, so I assume the alphabet thing is related to that and trying to make sense of her environment).

The positives in this is that she has a lot of specific interests, so if we want to teach her anything new, we can jump off of what she’s currently obsessed with. We play this new game with the animal alphabet where she says, “mommy, be a ____” (always starts with “ant”). So, I pretend to be an ant and then ask her to pretend to be an ant. Now she involves anyone who is around. This week it was me, Shamus, Nanny Williams, and Poppy Williams. She was interacting by choice (on her terms), and it was so great!

Another one of our favourite ways to encourage the kids to pick up language is singing. They absolutely love music, so we sing familiar songs and leave out words. Rory’s favourites to sing are “Wheels on the Bus”, “Old McDonald”, “Simon Says”, and “DINGO” (it should be BINGO – but…The Wiggles). The other week we had him in the bath and I was trying to get him to finish singing Skinamarink, so I sang, “Skinamarinky dinky dink, Skinamarinky do….” and from the other room you could hear Penny yell to finish it, “I…LOVE…YOU!” (That’s pretty good hearing for a kid who doesn’t even respond to her name).

So, as I was picking up Rory at daycare this past week, I heard a little boy ask a little girl, “Why doesn’t Rory talk?” and she responded with, “Well, if they taught him to talk, he would talk!” Out of the mouths of babes, amiright? I had no idea how to respond, because half of me wanted to be like, “I’ve put a lot of time and energy into this, ya bitch. He communicates in a lot of other ways”. But the logical 50% of me thought, she’s at most 4 years old, she doesn’t give a shit. I said nothing and then wondered if there’s any way I can simply educate young kids on the complexities of communication.

Speech/language is obviously the most common way to communicate, but there are so many others. There’s a few alternate ways to communicate like PECS, which Rory uses on and off (mostly to request food) – Penny will use it on occasion when she’s having a hard time getting her point across. There’s communication apps like Sounding Board and Proloquo2go, which is similar to PECS in that they have pictures, but it’s much more comprehensive and it’s on a tablet or iPad. Some people talk using sign language. I’m sure there’s other ways I can’t think of right now.

But really, just regular interactions are communicating. My kids will show they’re happy with smiles and hugs. If Rory wants something, he’ll often take you by the hand and bring you there. They both scream when they’re unhappy or stressed. They will put their hands on their ears to indicate it’s too loud. Penny will flap her arms to show she’s excited. None of these things require words.

I really am incredibly pleased with how much their speech is expanding, and I’m very hopeful about their language in the future (however long it takes – it sometimes feels like forever). I am dying to have a full-on heart-to-heart conversation with my kids. I want to pick their brains apart. In the meantime, I’ll try to enjoy their random musical renditions of Wiggles songs because really, who doesn’t love The Wiggles?