One of the most important things to me in my private practice is being able to better meet the needs of the families I was serving.  As of this spring I will have been providing private speech and language therapy for six years.  Starting this business has been a perfect fit for me and my therapy style BUT I decided to ask some of my clients how private therapy met their individual needs.  I am grateful to my clients for taking the time to let me know which aspects of my private therapy practice they felt most met their needs. 


​I asked to share some of their responses just in case you are debating private therapy and want to know a little more about what families come away with after their time in private speech and language therapy.

"I was always so happy with your visits.  I felt you always gave me and my boys great instruction on what to work on and how to implement it!  We never had any unmet needs.  You're truly the BEST!!!"

"Our biggest need when we considered private speech therapy was to get the best care possible.  Services (through the school district) didn't seem like a good option as the therapists are overwhelmed with too many children and I didn't feel as though we would get personalized car.  We wanted more of a personal, one on one experience.  Private therapy met those needs."

"You helped a ton with teaching the proper techniques to get the sounds to come out the right way.  Because of that my son still remembers to get the end sounds when he uses the strategies you taught him.  Both of my boys benefited greatly from working with you."

"I would say my biggest need was having him do it one on one.  Getting an individualized plan for him.  Me being able to be part of the "treatment/plan" so we were both being consistent and teaching him the same words, hand signs, etc.  I felt more informed and better able to help him."

"I really liked the on on one.  My son needed that extra attention and really excelled from it.  When in his school lessons (for the few weeks he took) he was overshadowed by other students, some needed more attention than others.  I also liked how once he could move on to the next lesson he did.  In school sessions he had to wait for the whole group. All of the fun activities you added always kept him interested as well (verses just worksheets in class)."

"Private therapy helped meet major communication barriers, helped give her the tools and confidence to correct and make sounds that she wasn't able to make, also you made speech fun and she responded really well to that."

I see a lot of preschoolers in my private practice, and with good reason.  Preschoolers (ages 3-5) are right in the middle of some of the most important language learning years.  You see a huge change in how a child communicates during this time.  Preschool is a golden time to target language skills. 

Because these kids are not in all day school yet, home is still their main source of language and learning.  Preschool children no longer qualify for Early Intervention which means they (might) get some preschool services through their school district BUT families miss out on the parent training that comes with Early Intervention.  

If you have questions about how you can help your preschooler at home I have some resources that might help! 

Preschool Development - This is the page I just finished with information about preschool language skills and tips to help you work on some of them

Helping My Preschooler Learn to Learn - This is a blog post featuring some ideas on ways to help a preschooler learn new things

Summer Pre-K Program - In this blog post I share a program that I use to introduce or review new letters/sounds the summer before kindergarten.

Have fun with your preschooler and should you have questions or concerns don't be afraid to reach out to your pediatrician, preschool teacher, or SLP!

Introducing my brand new page!  Several months ago Emily Hewlett contacted me asking if there was any way we could work together to help get parents more resources regarding growth and development.  She was working on her MS degree in Public Health and needed a Preceptor to oversee her Practicum.  I was delighted to help because getting development handouts for parents has been on my wish list for ages.  Her final product is AMAZING and you can read more about it in my previous blog post.  Today I sorted her handouts into developmental stages and created a new page for my website.  You can find it at the top right hand corner of this page or you can just CLICK HERE!

In my practice I see a lot of kids with low speech intelligibility.  What is my go to technique to help these kids form a sound?  A quick hand sign or tactile cue.  I have found in my practice that when kids are having a very difficult time producing a sound these kinds of cues really help...so I thought I would share!  

​A visual hand sign is a little reminder that you can give your child to help them remember what to do with their mouth.  Something like this:

Tactile cues are a little different from visual cues because they involve lightly touching your child's jaw/lips/nose etc. to remind them where and how to shape a sound. 

Some examples of tactile cues can be found in this awesome link created by Wendy Ryback, MA, CCC-SLP.

​Research has found that tactile cueing is particularly effective for kids with Childhood Apraxia of Speech (see ASHA's Apraxia of Speech Portal).

I don't strictly use these approaches.  My cues change based on things like the age of the child or the severity of their speech delay, or the types of errors a specific child is making.  BUT the above resources are a great way to try giving your kid some more specific help with sounds you are concerned with.  As always if you have additional questions or concerns talk with your pediatrician or local school district SLP!

Today I ran across an magazine article called "Getting a Jump on Learning" (you can read the entire article too by clicking HERE).  The author, Michael L. Robinson, supports the idea of helping preschoolers, ALL preschoolers prepare for kindergarten by gaining the capacity to learn.

These are the main strategies that Robinson suggests:

• First, remember that learning is active, not passive. We don’t receive knowledge: 
  
• we experience it. 
• Second, make learning fun.
• Third, teach your child using all five of his or her senses. 
• Fourth, point out detail and differences in objects. 
• ​Fifth, and perhaps most important, program your child to succeed. 

​
Wow, pretty awesome advice.  My background in speech and language totally supports all of these ideas.  Active learning really does help you encode new information better, which leads to better myelination of the nerve pathways, which leads to better retention and retrieval.  Learning through our senses promotes active learning, and also provides language regarding function words and adjectives.  Pointing out details and differences will help give your child a rich vocabulary that he can use when organizing his thoughts and will increase comprehension.  Giving your child opportunities to succeed will help him learn persistence and gain self-confidence.  Try to provide opportunities that challenge your child but are also within his reach.  It is no good failing and failing again, kids need to be able to be successful.

Don't get so stressed about learning letters and numbers that you are missing these kind of learning opportunities.  There is SO much more to learning than rote memorization, sometimes I think parents feel pressure to see their kids perform rather than help them learn.  Relax, have fun, and talk talk talk to that preschooler!

I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS).  In December my church makes a special effort to focus on our Savior.   Last year the LDS church offered a "Light the World: in 25 ways over 25 days" challenge. My family had fun trying to think of our Savior each day of the month leading up to Christmas.  We are excited to begin again this weekend.

Because winter holidays are generally a pretty big deal they are also a great way to work on functional applicable language skills.  I have created a calendar for the #LightTheWorld 2017 event based off the one found on lds.org (HERE) that includes ideas of how to apply each scriptural principle to your day.  Read through it, you will be amazed at how many activities are based on being able to communicate and use language (spoken, written, and social).  

As you begin traditions in your own home this year take advantage of modeling good language skills.  Provide examples of more complete sentences, explain how, why, where, when things are done.  Explore tastes, smells, how things feel and sound.  There is a whole world out there to share with your child this holiday season!

You can download the file here if you are interested:

We all know I LOVE using the holidays as a jumping off point for speech and language activities.  They are motivating, use language that is high frequency for that time of year, and they are just plain fun.  This activity is super awesome!!

This year I have been doing a TON of activities using prepositional phrases with kids.  I think I stumbled on THE BEST Halloween activity ever.  So I thought I would share.   
The book "175 Easy-to-Do Halloween Crafts" has this awesome craft idea:


Basically you take a 12x12 piece of scrapbook paper, fold it into 16 squares, cut the edges and then fold a house...it is SUPER easy once you have given it a try.  Then you get to let the kids decorate it however they like.  In my world that means I get little clip-art guys (I love the ones found HERE) and have the kids tell me where they belong on the house using prepositional phrases.

For example:
The skeleton goes inside the house, Frankenstein lives on top of the roof, the pumpkin sits beside the door, the witch is flying over the house, etc.  

You can work receptive and expressive skills (following directions, giving directions), you can work sequencing, you can work pronouns, you can work verbs...so many options!  Or you can throw the goals out the window and just decorate and have fun knowing you are providing a language rich experience.  No matter where your child's language skills are they will LOVE this activity.  Give it a try!

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) and Read Aloud 15 MINUTES just put together some awesome handouts with good information for parents and clinicians working with children ages birth to 5.  The handouts give information detailing communication development in children and offer tips for daily reading.  

If you have young kids or work with young kids you definitely need to click below:
Identify the Signs of Communication Disorders AWESOME NEW HANDOUTS

Hold out an “n” sound, feel for the bumpy spot on the top of your mouth just behind your teeth.  This is called your alveolar ridge.

When your mouth is at rest, it is best if you breathe through your nose, gently resting your tongue near your alveolar ridge. 
​
There are other times your tongue should be on or near your alveolar ridge as well:

• when you swallow food and drinks
• when you say these sounds:  t, d, n, l, s, z

The only sound you should make by touching your tongue to your teeth is the “th” sound.


Practice:
Try saying “na” 10x.  Feel for your tongue to touch your alveolar ridge.  Now try with “ta”, “da”, “la”, “sa”, and “za”…is your tongue touching* your alveolar ridge?
*for “sa” and “za” your tongue should be nearly touching your alveolar ridge.