Nov 05 2008
Speech Therapy at home? Not exactly.
I am not promoting the idea that parents can identify and remediate all speech issues at home. Speech therapists are highly trained and skilled at identifying issues and are an important resource. But there are times when either we cannot afford their services, especially if we do not want to go through the school system, or the issues seem to be minor enough that perhaps, with the right resources, we can attempt to remediate at home before we go on to seek the skills of a professional.
So, with all that being said, I have a child who has some articulation issues. He was delayed in his speech, and while he seems to be at grade level with his language expression and comprehension, I was a bit concerned about his articulation.
A friend on a homeschool list I belong to mentioned the program, “Straight Talk” from NATHHAN: National Challenged Homeschoolers Associated Network. First of all, I have to say the newsletter included in the box is phenomenal – it is packed full of resources – even pro-life resources like carrying to term sites, post abortion resources and pro-life doctors. What a testimony to their belief that all God’s children are to be cherished. NATHHAN is a wonderful, Christian resource for families who are homeschooling children with special needs!
Anyway, back to “Straight Talk” – I ordered the $55 package (free shipping) for “Straight Talk 1 – A parent’s guide to correcting childhood speech mispronunciations.” (please note there is a “Straight Talk 2 – A parents guide to language development”) – and it included a binder, the program, and a DVD.
The DVD has staged therapy sessions so that parents can understand how to work with their children. You watch the instructor adminster the quick test, a series of 29 pictures and a checksheet to note which sounds your child has incorrectly pronounced. You then check the age/sound chart to see if the sounds are sounds your child should have mastered by his age.
The next part goes on to the Word Probe – you take the sounds that your child had difficulty with and go to the the Word Probe page for that sound – you’ll find 3 columns of words, with the sound in the beginning, middle and end (there might be a 4th column for blends). You say the word, the child repeats and you make a note of how he said the sound such using a w sound for the r sound. Now, you know specifically where he has difficulties.
The final part is how to begin training to pronounce the sound correctly – isolated, syllables, words, sentences and then in conversational speech. In the Word Probe section prior to the words, you will find a page or two of detailed information on how that particular sound is produced – you are provided with teaching cues and may use things like a tongue depressor and a mirror to teach where your tongue should be when you say the sound “er”. Ideas are provided for how to motivate your child to do all the repetitions necessary. Pattern sheets are provided for some of the exercises. The DVD is helpful in getting an overview of the program as well as reinforcing when to move on, things like 90% accuracy with no cuing over 3 sessions for syllable sound training.
So far, I have only administered the quick test and word probes for the sounds my son had difficulty with, but already I realize that some of the sounds I can relax a bit on, he still has another year before I need to really work on those sounds.
Again, this is not a suggestion to bypass speech therapy. But just offered as another resource to consider.
Some other links that might be helpful:
- I also found another site with 350 picture word cards. These would be a useful addition to work on articulation and language aquisition. One further site is a list of word pairs from Caroline Bowen. You might use this as an adjunct to formal therapy, or a suppliment to what you are doing on your own.
- The blog from Mommy Speech Therapy has some useful exercises and links – I am using some of the ideas for working with the “t” sound and the placement of my son’s tongue.
No responses yet
