To find speech therapy useless?

[Tulipgold898]

My 2 year old is speech delayed. We are seeing a private speech therapist regularly and honestly don’t find it very useful. It’s all common sense stuff that I’m already doing having researched it quite a lot myself. Unfortunately all speech therapists have long waiting lists so can’t even change to another and see if it’s any different. Wondering if it’s just me or did people feel that there is really some value add with speech therapy?

I agree. My 2 year old was under SALT for almost a year. It was essentially all common sense and I used to come away feeling like a bit of a shit parent (talk to him a lot ). If it makes you feel any better, he's 6 now and is never quiet .

We used a lovely speech therapist who explained everything and gave me homework so that I could see the point and progress. Then she went on mat leave and recommended someone else who did god knows what, she'd go in to DCs nursery and I had to chase her up for feedback, was a mystery. We also went to the local authority's group speech therapy session, which did nothing, but were really useful for getting reports to ensure our DC was 'in the system' and we were got into a primary with good SEN provision.
So I would say, it's a long game, things will change as your child gets older, if you've not got a good rapport with the therapist try and find another one, there are good ones out there

Lots of people don't do the basics:
Talking to children
Leaving space for their replies
pronouncing words they have said wrong back to them right.
Reading to them
Less screen time
Dinners together.

These are very common sense and you are probably doing them but so many people don't.

We had lots of issues with specific sounds and needed ways to practice them and do stuff with their tongue position which I didn'tnt know. Also was an incentive to keep practicing.

The speech therapist is a nice lady I just don’t feel like the sessions are worth the money I am paying. I guess if I knew nothing about it I might find advice like avoid questions, follow his lead on what he enjoys or repeat words several times useful but I know all of this already.

It depends what the therapy is for.

My DS is 4.5 and I get so, so much from his private speech therapist. He has a phonological disorder with final consonant deletion. Every session he is learning a new sound or skill and it has made such a difference.

That said, even if we start a year ago at 3.5 I can't imagine it having the same impact, because he is old enough to really engage in it. I don't think there would have been any value at age 2.

I can see how it would be useful for articulation type issues. We are having it for a speech delay. At 2 he only has a very small handful of words. It may be that it just comes on its own at the right time for him but I also feel like I shouldn’t let the opportunity pass by to get some early intervention in case it’s helpful.

When it is a 'speech delay', then yes, a lot of speech therapy work is stuff that people can do themselves if they know a bit about it.
Of course SaLTs deal with a lot more than speech delay, so no, speech therapy isn't useless, of course it isn't.

Whether, with your dc's particular need, and your level of knowledge and commitment means you can help a lot yourself, so paying out £££ for a Private Salt is worth it, is a different question

Total communication approach fir a delay
Signs symbols PECS AAC choice boards etc

For a disorder or fluency specific speech therapy yes

For a delay generic stuff is good but give your child a voice by other means

A speech therapist who is familiar with PECS AAC makaton and wants your child to communicate is valuable

Not just one who is focused on speech alone

So early intervention shoukd mezn looking at how your child communicates wants Nd needs and build kn that
Does he point squirm shriek?
Can you show him choice boards to choose milk or juice?
When you going out do you show him images grassy park with ball or playground to choose?

I’ve used two different SALTs at huge cost over 3 years (must have spent 1,000s) since my child was 3.5yrs - I don’t feel it’s made the slightest difference at all to an articulation problem. Depressing really given all that effort and cost. And yes, I left every session feeling like a shit parent too

Maybe the SLT isn't a good fit for you and DC. Do you see them in your home or a clinic? Sometimes a session at home is really valuable for the SLT to observe how you interact at home? That way they may be able you give more personalised tips?

Some general advice (that you may already know but could be helpful to you or others....Make sure that the basics are well established. This is important before language develops. Eg. Good attention and listening, turn taking and play skills. Taking your child's lead and commenting on play (rather than asking questions) is helpful. Avoid 'correcting' your child. Just do lots of modelling to demonstrate language. If they have an older sibling keep an eye that they aren't 'doing the talking' for DC. Also take note of how much facilitation you're giving, to make sure that they really have to listen and understand your instruction (eg. Are you lifting their coat while you tell them to 'go get your shoes'? Giving a the context away can mask difficulty with understanding). Also think about their hearing- do they definitely hear you or would a hearing test be beneficial? Hope things start to progress soon. I expect they will

I didn’t find speech and language therapy at all useful when Ds was 2-3yo. Looking back at that time (he is 9yo now) nobody picked up that his receptive language was also very poor, they were just focussed on his expressive language.

All I was told to do was to play with him, which I had been doing for months and months and obviously was going to continue to do.

It had no impact. He was diagnosed at 4.3yo with classic ASD and it was only when we taught him how to copy (at about 3.6yo) that his communication improved. This wasn’t through SALT, this was us doing it intensively at home.

I tried Makaton with him, and it had no impact. The LEA SALT discouraged me from trying PECS but I didn’t listen, and DS grasped it at 4yo very quickly indeed and then ran with it. The spoken language started to come a few months after that.

Agree completely!

My (now) 5 yo has challenges prenouncing certain sounds. She has had multiple (10+) sessions with an NHS SALT since she was 3 and all we did for the full 20 min session was focus on the sound c (as in cat) repeating it again and again with the occasional cheer when she got it right.... It was tedious....

Then last September we got a letter saying demand for SALT was high and they would be in touch when more appointments were available but to "carry on doing what you are doing".

Her speech is getting better but she is behind her peers and still struggles with certain sounds. I don't have money to afford private so am just having to rely on Google for techniques and hope that it resolves itself....

As others have said at this age most of the therapy is parent led. We’ve had sessions with the speech therapist to “train” us as parents to provide the intervention at home. She has provided baseline and midway assessments so we can see progress. She has also videoed sessions to show us (parents) how to improve in the way we conduct the therapeutic sessions. We’ve also paid privately. This is the second speech therapist we have used because the first was not effective. I’d suggest moving to a different private speech therapist but remembering that at this age it’s very much parent led therapy. We’ve noticed a massive change in our dc over a relatively small period of time. It’s been worth perserving.

Verbal speech is not the only way to "speak"
Allow child time to communicate
Don't anticipate every need.
Some don't follow a typical pattern of development
Espec if ASD.

It has been very very useful for my son, but he is hearing impaired, so he has to be taught how to make certain sounds, he is unable to listen and learn because they obviously sound different ti him due to his hearing impairment.

My 5 year old has improved massively with speech therapy and no longer stutters in addition to properly pronouncing things now. It’s been over a year of weekly 1-hour sessions plus homework. I should say this in Switzerland and in French. DH (French) does the homework as I don’t want to muddy the waters with my British accent.

Not sure it did any good as his deafness was glue ear and adenoids. He still misses sounds and has a pronounced lisp, but is ok in school. Hearing test massively delayed because of covid.

It's very variable (disclaimer: I'm a SALT student, also a parent of a child with quite a complicated little mixture of communication issues) and yes, in the early years a lot of it IS common sense... but unfortunately to lots of families it's NOT. I had the "have you tried speaking to your child" conversations - introduced them to my other child who was a very advanced and early talker (and has never shut up since) and got an "ok, we'll skip that part of the appointment then!"

Background noise minimised because so much language is picked up by that incidental exposure and really focusing more on the back-and-forth conversation turns than doing the kind of performance parenting constant commentary that'll get you a mention on MN (and doesn't let the kid get a sound in edgeways)! At this age lots of it IS parent coaching and stating the blooming obvious really - and giving later talkers the chance to catch up.

And yes, as someone mentioned - there's a tendency to focus so much on the words coming OUT rather than the language that's going IN and being processed inside that little head (DD2 was very like that - couldn't articulate it, but blooming heck it was all going in).

The one thing I'd say is that it can be frustrating as fuck - you feel like you're getting nowhere and slogging away doing all the homework week in week out and it's only when you look back to where you've come from, rather than thinking about the ground you've still got to cover, that you realise the progress you're making - I've had to mentally slap myself around the head a lot of times to remember to do that with my own kiddo.

It's worth looking around if you really feel like you're getting nowhere though - and yes, I do hear the long waiting lists - I've been trying to get some updated reports done on my own child and it's taken me months to find a blooming SALT to do it - the irony of which does not cease to amuse and frustrate me. I know round here you're looking at September for private therapy start dates now - the NHS backlog from Covid all seems to be trying to go private and the whole house of cards is looking distinctly wobbly right now.

And @rachelvbwho - my little girl started school with about 25% intelligible speech (she has verbal dyspraxia), by age 5 there were loads of sounds still missing that she couldn't say (bear in mind that there are some that aren't really "missing" until well past that point) and I used to feel so down about her not being on a par with her peers - but she DID nail it, left infants speaking really clearly (it's always likely to have some quirks to it) - regressed a bit during bloody lockdown - but she can more than hold her own nowadays and make her views on anything and everything known!

One of mine was 2 when started speech therapy. He carried on having to have therapy until 7/8. An intensive year course at nursery age improved him to avoid a language unit for reception. It does take time and you have to really be putting in practise at home everyday too

Should add this was all on nhs. The intensive year was a game changer (nursery year so 3) as it was 1:1 every week plus group session same week and parenting classes about language disorders.

Yes! One of mine deletes final consonants and mixes up sounds, it was picked up at 2 and I paid for private speech therapy when she was 3 as NHS not offering face to face appointments and it just didn't seem to get us anywhere. We're now waiting for another NHs video call which is almost useless and no one has ever physically examined her.

She doesn't fit the normal mould of help as she has a wide vocabulary and we can easily converse (she's 3.5) but I essentially have to translate another language. I do everything day to day that's recommended but all that happens is that she learns more words incorrectly!

It's a long process. My son started at that age and is still attending at 8. We've obviously seen improvement but he has a few sounds he needs help with

My daughter gets it on school as she has a learning disability so again, another long term thing.