If your 18-month-old child can say no more than two or three words then you should take action, said consultant paediatrician at Columbia Asia Hospital Cheras Dr Kenneth Looi Chia Chuin.
He told Bernama that toddlers should be able to point at an object and name them by the age of 15 to 18 months old.
By age 2, a child should be able to make simple sentences from a pool of 30 to 50 meaningful words.
Parents with children who are not developing speech skills at an expected pace should take action.
Dr Kenneth explains that speech delay can be caused by many factors such as health problems, hereditary, or developmental syndrome.
However, during the previous Movement Control Order (MCO) he noticed that there is a significant increase in child speech delay cases.
The culprit, he surmised, is too much screen time. Parents are distracting their toddlers with devices, like tablets and smartphones, while they work from home because of constraints.
One of the common mistakes made by the parents is that they are giving too much gadget screen time to their toddlers, especially those under 18 months.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) screen time guidelines, parents cannot even give any gadget screen time at all. As for those aged 2 to 3 years old, the recommended screen time is just about one hour every day.
Columbia Asia Hospital Cheras consultant paediatrician, Dr Kenneth Looi Chia Chuin.
He added that parents should take an active part in their toddlers’ device usage and promote healthy habits.
In other words, don’t let toddlers just spend their screen time alone, interact with them and play with them.
Managing director and consultant occupational therapist at Well Rehab Centre Lee Wei Qing said therapy can help children who have speech delay problems.
He told Bernama that the process begins with an assessment, to identify the child’s strengths and weaknesses and establish a baseline to compare his or her progress during therapy.
At the same time, parents need to play their part by practising speech and encouraging their children to speak at home.
Lee also recommends that parents keep TV and screen time to a minimum during lessons to help the progress.
The biggest concern right now is that most of the parents nowadays tend not to talk as much to their children as they otherwise would, while in fact, children will learn to speak best when they are spoken to.
Well, Rehab Centre managing director and consultant occupational therapist Lee Wei Qing.
