Rockstar08

Hi I have my 3 year old son in pre-school. He is having a little difficulty forming his sentences and communicating with the other kids and teachers. His doctor and teachers have both referred to a speech pathologist.

He can speak and communicate, but for some time, his mum and I have noticed that he has trouble deciding on how to ask for things, on which words to choose and how to formulate a sentence. We think the root cause is that his mum uses the American way and I use the British way.

I am concerned that using an American speech pathologist, he'll formulate his sentences in the American way, i.e. making statements as questions, raising the tone at the end etc, as ultimately, we'll be heading back to the UK and we want the transition for him to be as easy as possible when we arrive.

Anyone else experienced a similar issue, any advice?

MsElui

my son was 1 when he came over and had a speech delay. at 3 he was not considered bad 'enough' to get school pre k classes but did get private speech therapy on our health insurance.

He is now in second grade - and his teacher referred him to the pathologist as he doesn't say some things clearly. (he uses a nasally tone in places). They have deemed it now bad enough to give school therapy -(i guess he didn't grow out of it like they imagined he would).

To get to the point of they saying yes he needs it - i had to fill out a bunch of documentation and go in and speak to the Councillor etc. I would use the same discussion to bring up any concerns you have, and see what they say. I must admit - I would be inclined to just get him talking smoothly now as if it slows him down he could fall behind in many areas. Then once he moves back to the uk - see if it bothers him. he may be able to deal with it much more effectively if he can already speak smoothly one way.

Sally Redux

Are they really that different? It's not like they're different languages. (We met an 8-year-old who could speak three languages last week).

Not belittling your son's difficulty, but I would think once he has the therapy he will be able to switch as necessary.

Anian

My daughter needed speech therapy at school for about a year when she was 6-7. Similar reason, her brain couldn't choose the words quickly enough. She is fine now, although we still live in the US so she talks "normally" for here.

Bob

Depending on the state, might look into EI? Early Intervention stops at 3 years in MA, but goes on for much longer in ME/NH. Even if you can't use them, they are usually a good resource for help.

Noorah101

Sorry, no direct experience, but I am curious what you mean by Americans raising the tone at the end of statements to sound like questions. If you make a statement such as "I went to the store today". There is no raised tone at the end.

If there's coma in the sentence, such as "I went to the store today, and you won't believe what happened!" Then there's s slight raise on the word "today", but still not as much as a real question, "Did you go to the store today? "

I would expect a speech pathologist to work with the child in developing "normal" speech patterns for the culture in which the child lives and the pathologist was taught. If that ends up being American pronunciation and intonation, that would be normal for the USA.

Rene

GeoffM

My 3 year old has an unholy mix of American, British, and Filipino accents. I've decided there's not much I can do about it: she'll fall naturally into whatever accent she's comfortable with. Though I did try to teach her to say "home" without using the nose so much.

There does seem to be an emphasis on speech therapists here. One in every school we've seen so far. Our son has half an hour a week IIRC with one but I don't think there's anything wrong at all! But I don't think it does any harm either so... whatever.

Rockstar08

@Noorah101

Pronunciation Intonation, is what I am referring to.

American English Pronunciation: Intonation Practice

Here is another reference..

Want a promotion? Don't speak like an AUSSIE: Rising in pitch at the end of sentences make you sound 'insecure' | Daily Mail Online

Pulaski

I agree. The differences are marginal when considering the mountain that children climb from "no language" to fairly good sentence formation by age four. It is not uncommon for children raised in bilingual households to speak both languages simultaneously and to be pretty good at separating the two languages fairly early on, not mixing languages in the same sentence.
I think you're over thinking things. To some degree, i.e. mostly, if you've made your home here you need to go with the flow. Little Miss P doesn't sound like me, and I never expected her to, though she picks up a few words from me and has recently decided that British - English is "cool" and has adopted a few markedly British pronunciations including zed and zeh-bra (as opposed to zee and zee-brah).

And I am not sure what your beef is with asking a question by making a statement with an upward tone at the end. It is perfectly normal in the UK, although face-to-face people may overlook the upward tone but would notice the frown/puzzled look that would typically accompany it.

ETA You're not talking about valley girl speech are you, where every sentence ends on an upward note, making every sentence sound like a question?

kimilseung

My nipper had a couple of years of speech therapy in school. We thought it might have something to do with two accents/dialects at home. The school dismissed this very quickly, pointing out the sounds and patterns that were in question and how they were not really reliant on accents, but on child development. This of course does not mean your case is not accent based, just adding my experience.

kimilseung

Yes this. We were not concerned about her speech until the school pointed it out to us, not entirely sure what difference was made either. As you say no harm either. There do seem a few of us on here with kids who have had the therapy.

Rockstar08

I agree, I have to say that i wasn't really concerned before this. But having both his teacher and doctor comment, did make me rethink somewhat. The teacher also did say that she didn't think it was accent/dialect related, although she didn't provide any reasoned argument to that point.

The system over here seems to emphasize speech pathologists, via referrals, definitely from the medical side, but it also seems from the education establishment too. It is a private school.

After reading the responses, we'll probably pursue it.

Thanks for your input!

kodokan

My daughter lived in the UK until she was 4, speaking perfectly normal British English in a nondescript south-east accent (I'm from Hertfordshire). From 4-7, we lived in Switzerland, and she spoke British-accented English at home, and (eventually) French at school, in a perfect rendition of the Swiss Vaudoise accent, which is the French equivalent of speaking in a slow, rural Dorset drawl.

After 6 months in the US, she'd adopted the local AZ accent for school 'because they don't understand me very well otherwise'. And she was REALLY good at it, really quickly - I had her and a friend in the back of the car not long after we arrived, and had to look in the rear view mirror to see which one was speaking!

The British English continued at home. Recently, however, after 3 years here, I've noticed a trend of adopting a slightly more American intonation if she comes to talk with me soon after watching US-narrated Youtube videos (about Littlest Pet Shops; it's her current thing). It wears off after a couple of minutes of talking British with me, however.

It's tempting to take her to live somewhere like Glasgow or Newcastle, just to see what would happen next...

But I wouldn't worry a jot about it for your little one. Either you'll stay here, and he'll completely fit in, or you'll move back to the UK and he'll adapt almost overnight, or you'll move back to the UK and he'll retain his US accent. Which is no bad thing - my almost 15 year old son has absolutely no trace of a US accent and speaks in a very prim BBC-style English, and this appears to give him rockstar status at high school, where in a student body of 3,500 even all the older kids seem to know who he is! And it works the other way round, too - a US boy turned up at my son's UK primary when he was about 7, and the other kids thought he was fantastically exotic and were queueing up to be his friend.