Speech problem.

If he is offered speech therapy do please go for it! Speech therapists are happy to make assessments and either give reassurance that all is well or start treatment. My younger daughter had it years ago and it made all the difference to her receptive and expressive language, although she later turned out to be dyslexic.

and I am in grief over the ailing health of the new little one.

What has happened Rock n roll?

I'd say (as a retired teacher) that it's far too soon to worry. Children develop at their own individual pace, with girls often speaking clearly well before boys do.

One of our GC is like this. His speech has always been indistinct and with two older siblings (who seemed to understand what he was saying) and 'translated' or got him what he needed he didn't bother much with speaking. Once he started school Speech Therapy was recommended but it was infrequent and not particularly effective and has now been withdrawn. He is now 7 and there is some improvement in his speech, largely due to the efforts of his parents to help and encourage him. But he's still well behind other children in his class, and I doubt that he'll catch up before he moves to secondary school. He's a very happy child and not at all worried that other children and adults can't understand him, but I do worry that his lack of speech is holding him back educationally and socially and will continue to do so.

It’s possible they are aware that his speech is delayed but that they don’t want to discuss it with anybody.
It’s very possible he is already having speech therapy.
You have made your concerns known, now let it go and leave it up to them. If nothing is better in a year, gently mention it again

A good friend of mine also thought that her GS was difficult to undress and distracted often - I did too - at 5 years old the school noticed the distraction and the lack of clarity in certain vowels/consonants. He was referred to a Paediatric Otolaryngologist, who diagnosed loss of hearing on both ears. He is now 7 and is wearing those colourful hearing aids. He has accepted them and speak very clearly.
I don't know if its the case for your GS but it should be picked up quite soon either by the pre-school or at school. Wishing him well.

understand - sorry predictive...

If there is a speech problem it has probably been identified at pre-school/nursery but unless it is very serious they rarely act on it; it is left Reception to take action, because sometimes it is developmental.
Speech therapy is available; difficulties will arise if the parents refuse to acknowledge that there is a problem, and they seem very defensive. Much of support therapy involves exercises to practise at home; interpreting what he is saying is not going to help the child express himself clearly.
If there is a problem school will recognise it and will speak to the parents; they may listen to them where they are afraid to acknowledge it now, and hopefully accept the help and guidance offered.
Difficult to stand back, I know.

I cannot believe anyone would present flash cards to a child of only 17 months!!

I remember being concerned about my 2 year old son. He barely had any words and had terrible tantrums. Shortly before his 3rd birthday he suddenly started speaking hundreds of words, tantrums vanished and he never looked back. Now he’s a senior director for a large U.S. corporation.

glammagran, it was all the rage in the 1960s, books were published with titles like 'How to breed a brighter child'. It seemed to consist of constantly showing childrn from about a year flash cards. Never read them or used anything similar so I am a bit hazy about details, but this was for reading not talking.

Has his hearing been tested? It could be as simple a problem as too much ear wax. Glue Ear is incredibly common at this. If he has impaired hearing the words he is saying would be indistinct as this is how he would be hearing them.

One of my cousins did not speak until she was 2 years 9 months old. The more people went on about it, it seemed the less likely was she forthcoming.

Eventually she spoke a whole sentence. And that was that ?

If you dont really see a lot of that GC and then when you do see him you pick out problems... you cannot imagine it'll go down well!

My youngest has a lisp. She has been on the waiting list for speech therapy for 2 years now and we still don't have a date.
I was told not to make a fuss but repeat back to her words said not quite right. It does work.
She suffered NO delay in reading, writing or maths skills and half way through her reception class last year, she was reading year 1's books.
Keep reading, singing and focus on phonics. Correct a few words and concentrate on key phonetic sounds. Jolly phonics books and cd may help.
My dd has also some hearing loss, thankfully not as much as my elder daughter who had hearing aids.
Both were very premature.

Very true notanan2!

My mother was convinced that one of my daughters had 'knock knees' (she didn't), they were all too pale and far too thin, oh, and they couldn't hold a proper conversation or do as they were told (they didn't really want to).

Her worries stemmed from my being a vegetarian, breast feeding, working mum. In her mind that meant they were terribly deprived and neglected.

She was concerned that my eldest daughter didn't crawl (until she suddenly started walking at nine months) and worried that my second son didn't utter a word at two and a half. When he did eventually speak, at nearly three, he spoke in complete sentences!

Unfortunately, I took all of her concerns as direct criticism of my relaxed parenting style. Of course, all four of them are very healthy, clever, happy and successful - funny that!

Either its so pronounced that you as a rare visitor noticed, in which case other more better placed/involved people will have noticed

Or you spent your rare time with your GC noticing negative things rather than noticing their good points and being complimentary.

Either way, not your place! (Not because youre a GP, GP who do a lot of care would be well positioned to bring it up, but because you dont see them much)

Good advice from the nursery to suggest playing with other children. Nursery will probably be monitoring their speech and language to ensure that they don’t raise unnecessary concerns. First thing I would ask (as an ex nursery manager) would be to ensure that there are no problems with hearing either constantly or intermittent.

kircubbin2000 thanks for your concern and sorry for the apparent cryptic post. I added it straight after my former post but it appeared separated so sorry. I had replied to OP about the language concern, and added at the end that the concern had been put on the back burner because they had just had a premature baby and I said that was their main concern..and I added that it was mine too. But its a different subject. The baby has been born with a very debilitating condition congenital myotonic dystrophy. Which is very sad and we are still trying to understand.

Sorry to hear that.

DD1 was very fluent from at least 20 months old, the staff marvelled at her when I went to the antenatal clinic when expecting DD2. DD2 was much more advanced physically than DD1, could walk much earlier than DD1 had, but her speech was not good. I couldn't always understand her but DD1 could and acted as interpreter. DD2 went to speech therapy when she was just under 4. Soon sorted out.

Is there any indication that he might be a bit deaf? Often children who struggle to hear find enunciating properly quite difficult.
Also - do please read to him as often as you can, especially books with a bit of a rhythm to them (Such as Stickman etc) . Concentrating on listening to the words and of stories is great for speech and comprehension. And it's great for instilling a love of books. (Well I would say that, wouldn't I?!)

Wait and see what happens when he goes to school.

His parents obviously did not take kindly to your expressed concern.

None of us would ever have stopped speaking baby language if our parents had happily translated everything we said, so IMO your son is at fault here.

The nursery and the health visitor may well have mentioned the matter too, which might well explain why you got your head bitten off.

I hope the matter sorts itself out once your grandson starts school and finds himself amongst people who won't just accept his way of speaking. If it doesn't, please don't get involved, leave his teachers to deal with the matter.

Speaking as a teacher myself, I have on occasion made myself unpopular by pointing things out to parents that they did not want to hear, but usually the parents concerned did listen and found it easier to deal with a teacher than a family member if there was cause for concern.

My, then, hree year old granddaughter was like this and I couldn’t make head nor tail of her speech, but her parents could! But they did have her checked out by a speech therapist....and they said she was fine ...that she had all her sounds but just ‘mixed them up’ ...by the time she was 4 you could hold an intelligent conversation with her. She seemed to change overnight! Don’t worry too much...he sounds like he’s chatting and singing and everything else will fall into place. Just enjoy the little chaps’ company.

So sorry to hear about your poorly DGC Rocknroll. I looked it up and sounds like such a worry and a horrible disease. One thing I did read was that a milder form can cause speech problems so could that have anything to do with your DGD? Probably not for you to suggest though as parents will be so worried about the baby and not need any more stress.