Our son, Owen, had approx. 100 words as he approached his 3rd birthday, most of which were very difficult to understand due to poor pronunciation. He would get frustrated when we couldn’t understand him and was prone to tantrums when told no.
Cluas was recommended to us by a friend whose son was also experiencing speech difficulties.
The Cluas office set up is fantastic for children with plenty of toys to allow them explore without feeling under pressure. The consultation with Cluas was very thorough and we were made aware that Owen had a significant speech and language delay, it became apparent that we had been over estimating how much Owen understood as he was relying on gestures and environmental cues. He was unable to answer simple questions such as ‘what’s your name’, ‘what age are you’. As a parent this was a very worrying reality that Owen was so far behind his peers.
We decided to go ahead with the Cluas program and started 2 days after his 3rd birthday. I was skeptical about how Owen would react to the headphones but they didn’t bother him whatsoever and he saw it as play time. The results were almost instant, over the course of phase 1 Owens vocabulary exploded and very quickly he was able to put 2 words together with ease. He was able to answer questions relating to his name, age, sisters name etc Part of phase 1 was targeted at improving Owen’s understanding and we could see he was making great strides in this area too, we were better able to reason with him and saw less tantrums and frustration. It was post phase 1 that we were able to successfully toilet train Owen as his understanding increased.
Phase 2 saw Owen go from strength to strength learning colours, numbers, singing songs and he began putting more and more words together.
Watching Owen during phase 3 was like pieces of a puzzle coming together, suddenly he was using connecter words, verbs, understanding and using concepts like ‘under’, ‘out’, ‘in’, ‘on’ etc.
When we started our Cluas journey it was evident that Owen couldn’t communicate effectively and it felt like we would never be able to catch him up, now Owen doesn’t stop talking! He’s more sociable and confident and can follow instructions without hesitation. He recently started Playschool and settled in straight away, I know he would not have been ready for that transition prior to doing the Cluas program.
Throughout the Cluas program the support and guidance from Ronan has been incredible, his expertise and practical advice have been a constant source of comfort. He has a wonderful manner with children and Owen always ran into the office happy to be there.
It is astonishing to think how far Owen has come in such a short space of time. We feel the program has unlocked Owens potential and would highly recommend Cluas.
Many thanks, Lisa.
Lisa, September 2018 – Dublin