Beautiful Words!

Sam's progress verbally in the past month has been nothing short of amazing. His expressive labels now number well over 100. (If he sees something he knows the name for, he can say the name of it). In addition, he is finally using his carrier phrase, "I want"... for things he wants. For example, instead of just saying "cookie", he says "I want cookie". The great thing about his carrier phrase is that his mastery of it means he can speak in sentences!

Another great development has been through a program called "Sing to Speak" that Sam's teachers at school started using. They said he loved it, so we purchased the program so we could have it here at home. It consists of a picture book and a cd that is personalised just for him, so the songs help him to say things like "my name is Sam" and "I live in Keller, Texas". He goes nuts for it...he's been telling us "I want book" so we'll get it down for him and put on the CD. His favorite song is about animal sounds. The song goes: "the (animal) says (animal sound)" and the pictures in the book correspond with the animals in the song. So he's been replacing his generic babbling sounds with "the lion say ROAR!" and "the cow say MOO!" Last night in the bathtub Sam and Grace were exchanging meaningful conversation...Sam was saying his phrases and Grace was repeating the animal sounds he was making! Praise God!