If you're a parent, you know the excitement of waiting for your child's first words, typically somewhere between 12 and 18 months. But since the pandemic, some children have been taking longer to start talking and that's leading to a spike in requests for evaluations by speech pathologists.
It's a trend reporter Lindsey Banks wrote about for the Charlotte Ledger Business Newsletter, and she joins us now to talk more about it.
Marshall Terry: So, Lindsey, what did Charlotte's speech pathologists tell you they're seeing? And how much longer is it taking for some toddlers to speak their first words?
Lindsey Banks: So, since the pandemic, speech pathologists across the country have been reporting a higher percentage of children who need therapy, which they test by a speech evaluation. So they've seen an increase in children who are basically failing their speech evaluations. By failing, I mean they aren't talking and forming words at their age level.
So I spoke with the executive director of the Charlotte Speech and Hearing Center, which is a nonprofit practice in Charlotte that serves Union and Mecklenburg Counties. Her name is Shannon Tucker, and she told me that in 2019, which is pre-pandemic, they screened 2,200 children and saw an average 20% failure rate, which again is referring to those children who aren't speaking at their age level.
And then in 2022, coming out of the pandemic, they screened around the same number of children and they saw a 50% failure rate. They saw a 65-70% failure rate in those higher poverty areas of Charlotte and Union County.
And then regarding your second question about how much longer it's taking toddlers to speak their first words, it obviously depends on the child. But I spoke with a Charlotte mother who had her son right before the pandemic. He was around five weeks old when the whole world essentially shut down and around nine months (old) when he should have at least been, you know, baby babbling and trying to form words. Her son wasn't making any sounds, and then when he reached 20 months that was still the case — he wasn't talking. They took him in to be screened and they got him into speech therapy.
Terry: So what's leading to this increase in speech delays?
Banks: So stimulation, I learned, outside of the home is so important to children's speech development, and the pandemic shut down everything. So that meant no story time at the library, no play dates, no playing with other children on playgrounds and no trips to the grocery store even. And because these children were staying at home, their only social interactions were with their parents. Maybe their grandparents, maybe a babysitter, but basically adults that knew the child and knew the child's nonverbal cues — the adults were able to anticipate the child's needs before they were able to ask. So for some children, they just essentially were like, ‘Why learn how to speak when, you know, I don't need to. Whenever I need something, it's given to me before I even know I need it myself.’
Terry: Now, not being around other children and adults, as you mentioned is one aspect of this. But what about the wearing of masks, and not being able to see people talk? Did that have an effect?
Banks: Yes, and that's a great question. Another thing that I learned is that lip-reading and watching mouth movement is also an important factor in a child's speech development. And lip-reading usually begins around eight months of age. So they start looking at mouth movements and mimic when they're trying to form words. And so the limited times that young children were leaving the home, you know, during the pandemic, maybe to go to the doctor — or once quarantine restrictions were lifted and parents started to venture out more with their children — they were hearing people talk to them, but they weren't able to see their mouths because they were covered by a mask.
But for (children in) speech therapy, the mother that I spoke to, she told me that her child's therapist during the pandemic wore a clear mask during their in-person session so that (the child) could see her mouth movements. They also offered Zoom therapy sessions as well, which obviously means they didn't have to wear masks. So they were able to see the mouth movement. But if your child had not been evaluated and, you know, they weren't in speech therapy, then any interaction they had outside of the home with adults or other children was behind a mask.
Terry: You report the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association recently sent out a survey to speech pathologists around the country. What did it find?
Banks: They sent out that survey earlier this year. And of the 858 language pathologists that responded, 80% said they believe the pandemic affected the referrals and requests for evaluation of young children. 69% said they were getting more referrals and requests for evaluation of young children than they did before the pandemic began. And then 64% say the main cause for the increase in evaluations after the pandemic is limited opportunities for social interaction or to play with peers, which we talked about earlier.
Terry: So what does all this mean in the long run for children? Are they likely to catch up and even out?
Banks: So Shannon Tucker, the executive director of Charlotte Speech and Hearing Center, she's also a speech pathologist. She told me that language development of children is highly predictive of third-grade reading levels — and even high school graduation — which is why it's so important to have your child evaluated if they are not communicating at the level that they should be. Like with most things, the earlier you diagnose the problem, the easier it is to fix.
Charlotte Speech and Hearing Center has not seen numbers of children being evaluated and failing return to pre-pandemic numbers yet — but they expect it will. Day cares are open, story time with kids, and music classes are, you know, up and running again. And masks aren't really required anymore.
