Parents should refrain from using electronic gadgets to keep their children occupied too often, as it might retard their linguistic development, a Taitung Christian Hospital doctor said last week.
Parents should spend at least spend half an hour every day with their children, no matter how busy they are, so that their children can develop language skills normally, rehabilitation specialist Wu Hsin-yi (吳欣宜) said.
She cited the case of a mother who brought her three-year-old son, Hsiao-chun (小鈞), for a check-up to see if he had a language disorder.
Photo: Wang Hsiu-ting, Taipei Times
During the examination, the boy uttered a string of sounds, with an occasional English word thrown in such as “yellow” and “red,” Wu said.
“When we tried to encourage Hsiao-chun to talk about colors, we realized that the words he uttered had no connection to what he was saying before or after that,” she said.
“Asking the mother what could have led to the situation, we learned that because she was so busy with work, she often let Hsiao-chun play games or watch English-language videos on her cellphone,” Wu said.
However, that meant the English words Hsiao-chun had learned were simply sounds and held no linguistic meaning, so they were useless in his daily life, Wu said.
The development of one’s linguistic capabilities is dependent on human interaction, so for a child to understand what is being said and to be able to articulate their own needs, they must be given context and the appropriate environment, the doctor said.
If children who are at least one year old cannot say “mom” or “dad,” and if by age two, they cannot speak simple words, then they are showing signs of serious delay in language development and should be taken to the nearest hospital for an exam, Wu said.
Taitung County has a severe shortage of speech therapists, with Taitung Christian Hospital having just two such therapists, so Hsiao-chun has been put on a waiting list for treatment, Wu said.
“We have suggested that his mother use coloring books or cards to interact with him and help him learn to speak,” she said.
Other children experience language development delays caused by exposure to electronic devices, but Hsiao-chun is one of a few that has exhibited such obvious symptoms, the doctor said.
Wu called on parents to interact with their children more to give them more opportunities to practice questioning and answering.
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