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Dear Care and Feeding,
I have a 4-year-old daughter, “Sara,” and a 2-year-old son, “Kyle.” Sara’s very bright and outgoing, whereas Kyle is far less interactive; he can understand you and talk a little, but he almost never does. He does most of his “speaking” in a private language Sara developed, which for the life of me sounds like birds tweeting. I thought it was concerning, but not quite rising to the level of intervening, at least until recently.
I was doing some math exercises with Sara, and as we were winding down, she wanted to try one of the ones in the back of the book, something “really hard.” I chose one more or less at random and asked what 14 times 12 was. She looked around a bit, and then asked me if she could get help with that. I nodded, and she immediately went over to Kyle, who was playing with some blocks in the corner, and started tweeting back and forth with him. A moment later she came back and said that it’s 168. That is of course the right answer…
I asked if Kyle told her that. She nodded and claimed he’s a lot better than she is at math. I didn’t really believe that, and I’d never even seen Kyle do anything with numbers, so I went over to him and asked how he knew the answer to Sara’s question. I then got the longest speech I’d ever heard out of Kyle, who said that 14 times 12 is just 10×10 + 10×2 + 10×4 + 2×4, and all of those individual calculations are easy, and you can just add them all up to get 168.
So apparently my near-mute son is some kind of math wizard and my daughter figured it out before anyone else did, and that birdtweet language they came up with is capable of communicating a lot more than I had realized. It’s got me reeling a bit. I don’t understand how I could miss such important developments with my kids, happening right under my nose.
It’s making me wonder what else I’m missing and whether or not I’m a good mother. What should I do with this new development, and what should I be keeping a lookout for in the future?
—Do the Math
Dear Do the Math,
Try not to think about your kids’ abilities or development as referendums on your parenting. Remember that they are just being who they are right now, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Your son is only 2—if he was developing fairly typically in other areas, hitting his physical milestones, etc., there wouldn’t be much for you to notice until he began communicating in an unexpected way. You did notice, and you’ve been monitoring, and in the meantime, you didn’t get upset or try to prevent your children from communicating in the language they came up with together. All that seems ok to me!
By now it’s probably occurred to you that your kids inventing their own language could be a sign of neurodivergence in either/both of them. Your son’s apparent aptitude in math is another interesting data point. If I were you, I’d probably want to have both of them evaluated—not because any of this is super alarming, but because it could help you learn more about them and determine whether they might benefit from additional support or intervention in some area or another. Getting more information about our kids—their strengths, their idiosyncrasies, how they think and learn and communicate—can help us better know and appreciate them, as well as support their growth.
Your kids sound amazing, and I think it’s wonderful that they’ve found a system that allows them to understand one another so well. It doesn’t mean they’ll always want or need to use their special language. If you’re concerned about it, remember that it hasn’t kept Kyle from understanding or learning to speak with you. You now know that how he communicates doesn’t say anything definitive about his intelligence or capability. Appreciate your kids for who they are, as different as they may be (from each other; from other kids), and assume competence whenever possible. Recognize their respective strengths, keep encouraging them in their interests, and get ready for them to keep learning and surprising you.
—Nicole
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