• Speech & Language

     
    We are excited about helping your child reach his/her speech and language goals this year!!! We are dedicated to helping children with communication disorders gain confidence and improve their academic skills.
     
    Speech and Language can be broken down into several categories:
     

    Articulation: How sounds are produced by moving the mouth.
    Language: How a person understands others (receptive language) or shares thoughts, ideas, and feelings (expressive language).
     
    Voice: How sound is made by air passing from your lungs through your vocal cords.
     
    Fluency: Repetitions and/or prolongations that break up the smooth flow of speech.
      
    Auditory Processing: The brain’s ability to use the information it hears through the ears.
     
    Social Language: Using language for different purposes while following the rules of conversation and changing language according to the needs of the listener.
     
    Speech Therapy Rules and Strategies
    (These rules are designed to promote listening skills, attention, and memory.) 
     

    -Good Sitting

    -If you forget, ask, “Can you Repeat?”

    -Eyes on the Speaker

    -If You Don’t Understand Ask for Help

    -Raise Your Hand

    -Visualize to Help You Remember

    -Listen Before You Do

    -Look and Listen for Key Words

    -Stop, Think, Answer

    -Repeat It to Yourself to Remember

    -Create a Good Listening Environment

    -Keep on Topic

     
    Things You Can Work on at Home
     

    • Occasionally, carryover activities are sent home. These tasks are for you and your child to complete together.

    • Read with your child. While you are reading, talk about the rhyming words, words with your child’s target sound, vocabulary in the story, etc.

    • Encourage your child to use the strategies that he/she has learned in speech! For example, when reading a story, encourage him/her to imagine or visualize what is happening in the story.

    • Make learning fun! For example, after reading a story, your family can take turns acting out the parts of the story. Use props from around the house and encourage your child to use body language and facial expressions!

    • Please contact your child’s speech-language pathologist for more suggestions or if you have any questions!
       

    *As we address each student’s individual speech and language needs, we incorporate literacy goals and academic curriculum into all therapy session.