If Only. . .

Have you ever wanted to be a "Monday night quarterback"? Do you ever want to go back in time, and do things differently? I do. If I only knew, what I know today, circumstances just might be different.

Today, I am beginning to realize the connection between language development and reading. Oral language development is crucial for young children to develop, so as to provide the foundation or framework that they will use in later years to acquire writing language. Children need to be able to hear speech sounds, and realize that these sounds are made of words. In turn, children practice oral language in their speech. The problem is, is that they need to be about to hear and communicate. What about children who have experienced many ear aches or hearing problems during this developmental time, can this impeded their reading abilities in later years?

I think back when my child was an infant, he didn't speak much. He pointed to what he wanted, and being the third child, we just gave him what he wanted. He spent a lot of time on the go, observing the world around him. I didn't notice that he was not orally communicating with us, and just thought his speech patterns were normal. When he was 12 months old, I knew something was wrong, I just had that "gut" feeling, but didn't know what it was. I visited 6 pediatricians, who reassured me that they did not see anything wrong with the child. So I returned back to our family pediatrician who referred me to a ENT. At 18 months old, that doctor discovered that his adenoids were so enlarged that it affected his hearing. After surgery, I noticed for the first time that he was responding to sounds, jumping at a sound of a car passing by us. We continued with life after surgery, as his oral language was beginning to develop.

Today, I now wonder if the oral language delay played a role in his reading difficulties? Would speech therapy at a younger age would have developed the brain to prepare it for written language?