Trish, there are so many possibilities still, it could be anything. Certainly what you describe fits with autism, but it could also be global developmental delay, it could be simply lack of stimulation, it could be a hearing problem...
What you need to do, is pretty much what you are doing, only you needto document it. Write it down. Observe her and make a list of what you feel needs to be queried. Anything she does cute is worth listing here too - we so often forget these things even when we are convinced it was so memorable...
Other things you can do - test her hearing. What do you KNOW she will respond to? I tested te chocolate wrapper crinkle test, I knew my kids would respond to lolly wrappers at 20 paces! If she responds to her name - that is great, and a good sign. But if she doesn't - again, it could be a nuber of things. difficult child 3 at this age did not respond to his name, it was as if he didn't have a name or understand any meaning. His verbal utterances were repetitive and seemed like language because they included chunks ofwords from songs on the radio. I had him in occasional child care a lot which meant a lot of driving in th e car with the radio on; he learnt to sing entire songs but te words sounded 'blurred' and any incidental instrumental sounds in the songs were mimicked as well. Thinking back, he must have had a phenomenal memory to be able to reproduce such long strings of phonemes when he had no comprehension to help the memory along.
What you need to do - intense play and stimulation. As much stimulation as she can handle across as many different sensory areas as possible. Introduce touch, sight, sound, smell and taste. Talk to her all the time about what you're doing but keep your sentences simple and slow. Reduce the number of your words. See how she responds to this - it was what we were advised with difficult child 3 by speech pathologists in a class situation. Other kids responded brilliantly, difficult child 3 responded with anger and hostility. It's supposed to make it easier for tem because tere is less for tem to concentrate on. Too much complex language can make comprehension too difficult and a kid can give up and not try. In difficult child 3's case he knew what language was supposed to sound like and when I shortened it he felt patronised, I think, and showed his displeasure by turning his back and being oppositional.
Other things I did with difficult child 3 - this was from following my instincts and giving him more of hwat he responded positively to. He loved watching TV and DVDs especially if tere was writing on the screen - difficult child 3 turned out to be hyperlexic (from my understanding, hyperlexia is a subset of high-functioning autism and also Asperger's).
If she has language delay, she would be more likely to get a diagnosis of autism rather than Asperger's. At least in Australia. But a diagnosis of autism doesn't necessarily mean a worse prognosis - I personally thiink difficult child 3 is more capable than difficult child 1, even though difficult child 1 never had any language delay. But he has other problems which difficult child 3 doesn't have. It's aspectrum and you can run the gamut in each diagnosis.
Other things I did - I sat difficult child 3 on my lap while I played piano. Then I noticed how he tried to play NOT by bashing at the piano but by gently pressing the keys and choosing harmonious sounds. So I used his fascination for letters to help him learn to play a tune (ABC song, of course, which he already had learned to sing by copying me). He was still mostly non-verbal when he was learning to read sheet music - again, a step-by-step process using his obvious fascination for music and letters. And no, she's not too young if she shows an interest. difficult child 3 was an interesting mix - before we realised there was delay, we thought we had a child genius. we were getting ready to have him accelerated into school when we realised suddenly, he would be too delayed in other areas and pulled back.
Problems difficult child 3 had - he didn't talk. He didn't know his own name, nor did he know anyone else's. He didn't even know "mummy". The usual baby games of "where is baby's nose? where is baby's mouth?" he couldn't play, he never 'got' it. He was slower than most to recognise his own reflection. But he was fascinated very early on (a week old) with the flicker of light through leaves on the trees (very similar brain effect to hand flapping). easy child actually found te key for difficult child 3 - a facial expression game (weird, considering the social learning problems in autism). We would sit by the large bedroom mirror and make different facial expressions and name them. Happy, sad, angry, confused, scared - we would make each face and name them. Of course, it's a single word. That fit with what the speech pathologists told us. And soon difficult child 3 would have a turn at making the face, copying the way we had done it.
A follow-on from this - when he finally started school at age 5, he would at times say to his teacher, "I am angry," and put on his angry face from the game. very fake-looking, very stylised, but I had to emphasise to his teachers - just because the expression looks fake doesn't mean his stated emotion isn't very real. he wasn't acting when he told people he was angry, he was using every tool he had (his words pplus the older facial expressions game) to show them how he felt.
If you can get your hands on the book "Son Rise" it can give you some ideas on what the father did in that book. But basically what he did was meet the child on his terms, instead of trying to program the child to the father's. So when hhis son was sitting on the fo=loor spinning plates the dad got his own plates and sat by his son, spinning plates. At first he did it to try to get his own head into what it must be like for his son, but what hapened was - he was showing his son that he really wanted to be with him and do what he did. This introduced the son to the concept of sharing and togetherness, and from there they began to build bridges to one another.
if the problem is global developmental delay of some sort, stimulation is still the way to go. There is a developing brain in there which I strongly suspect has been under-stimulated. This can be a problem for ANY kid, but if there is an underl;ying disorder it just makes things so much worse. Brain pathways are being forged all the time, the younger the more. So utilise this and give those new pathways a direction and job to do. Make a textures box and as you get them out to touch them, tell her what they are. Squishy, wet, furry, fluffy, rough, smooth - it doesn't matter what you call them as long as you are consistent.
Have a sounds box - bell, block, cymbal, squeak - whatever you can put together easily.
We labelled things around the house - I printed words off the computer, cut them out and stuck them onto things around the house. Door, window, fridge, cupboard, TV, radio - whatever, wherever.
I let difficult child 3 use the computer. We actually found one on the council clean-up and re-worked it so it had all the baby software on it, then let difficult child 3 loose on it from about a year old. I think he was actually younger. By 2 he was typing the alphabet and reading the toolbar text to make the computer do what he wanted it to do. The first word he learned to read was "quit" (Apple Mac) and the second, interestingly, was "exit". And "stop" (we think, from stop signs on the road).
Numbers - teach her to count on her fingers. Only in English - it's important to keep all other languages away from her until she is fully verbal. Multi-lingual kids seem slower to talk because they're trying to assimilate more than one language at a time. But for 'normal' kids this isn't a problem. If there is a communication delay, a second language can really throw a spanner in the works, until the child can handle it. difficult child 3 has since learned German.
I suggest you enlist the other kids to help with this stimulation. It will help them in so many ways also. They may be lacking some of this somewhere in themselves and it can help consolidate teir own progress, to be part of what you are doing for their sister.
Something else I did for difficult child 3, I actually had started it for easy child when I was going through that ridiculous "Teach Your Baby to Read" stuff (babies will learn only if their brains are ready, but it doesn't hurt to try) - I set up a hard-paged photo album. These can be picked up for nicks at op-shops now we're all going digital. I printed out or drew a picture of the word (I drew my own face for "mummy") and wrote the word underneth, then put the picture and word on one page of the album. I then went through the album putting a single word and related picture on each page. Members of the family should come first, then pets, then any other words you want her to learn. Sit and read it to her often, get her to turn the pages. Encourage her to tell you what the words are.
Because it's hard-paged, it's very difficult for a baby to wreck it. Because the'yre so cheap, it's easy to replace it.
I also made small paper-only disposable books done the same way. Fold a sheet of paper in half; turn, then fold again. Turn, then fold again. Staple down one side, tape over the staples then cut the folds to release the pages. It by now should be small enough to fit into a pocket so the baby can read it whenever she wants. If she chews it up or feeds it to the dog, it's easy to make another. As she learns or needs a new word, it's easy to add one.
You will find what works best for her, but whatever you do - tlak to her, stimulate her, spend time with her, work with her (and the other kids). Tell her what you are doing. And when you put TV on for her, try it with subtitles. Do this for the other kids too unless they specifically ask you not to. But where possible - push the subtitles. Because it adds anotherlayer to learning communication.
Wherever you find a chink of progress or interest, work with it and try to make the chink bigger.
And keep records. Note what you do, what she does and how old she is when she does it. Record her progress because it will seee to you that progress is very slow, but it won't be. A lot of stuff goes in inside their heads and you feel you're gettingnowhere, but then one day she will just leap ahead and you will wonder how it happened.
difficult child 1 seemed to not be able to read. He made zero progress. Then one day he picked up a book and read it to himself, then got another book and read that. And another. He hadn't been able to read that morning, but by evening he was reading fluently.
Sometimes progress can seem that freaky, but it's because of all the work that went ahead.
Marg
