Am I wrong to refer dd4 (9yo) for SALT?

[gibbberish]

dd4 attended speech and language therapy when she was 4 for about 2 mths. I felt at the time they discharged her much too early but they felt her speech would develop with time.

However she is 9 now and still has problems pronouncing r and occasionally l. She can pronounce them fine at the beginning of words but if they are in the middle, i.e 'broken', 'click' etc she replaces with w.

I took her to our doctor for another reason and took the opportunity to ask about her speech and as a result she has been referred again for SALT. However, now that she is older she understands what is going on and is embarassed to have to see someone about her speech. Was I wrong to refer her? Should I have given her time to rectify her speech?

Feeling guilty and wondering whether it may cause more harm than good.

Hi, gibbberish,
I can appreciate her being a bit embarrassed going at her age but you are probably doing the right thing. Small errors like she is making are likely to be a habit so will stay if you do nothing but should be quite straightforward for a SALT to 'fix'. I should think it'll be easier for her to accept suggestions from the SALT than from you. My dh has a mild (I wouldn't notice it but he's very aware) speech irregularity and he said he wishes very strongly that he had been sent for some SALT before having to give speeches as an adult.

Hi gibberish,

I think the key is in explaining to her very clearly that this is not because her speech is wrong / babyish or anything like that. Not for a minute that you would imply this, but this is what she might think.

At her age I had to have speech therapy and orthodontic work done. I remember getting hugely upset when the orthodontist tried to explain to me how to brush my teeth properly. Just was mortified and burst into tears, the shame of them thinking I couldn't brush my teeth by that age! Now I look back of course they were only trying to help, and if my mum had explained to me and said 'look, they know you can brush your teeth, they're just wanting to show you a few special tricks to get right in all those nooks and crannies' (or something like that, just to soft soap it), then I would have felt much better and not embarrassed.

You are definitely doing the right thing of course to refer her. I've no doubt about that. Good luck!

The way you explain it the important part.

Dd1 has a severe S & L disorder but even by age 3 she was aware she had a problem, so I am sure that by age 9 your Dd knows she doesn't speak as well as some of her peers.
I concentrated on telling her that we were going to see someone who would help with her talking as I wanted her to he a really good talker...and she seemed to completely see the logic in this.
Sounds a bit simplistic for a 9 year old, but maybe in the context of some people get help with spellings, some with swimming...IYSWIM .. so that talking will easier for her when she is bigger
Absolutely the right thing to refer sooner rather than later

Ooooh didn't realise I had replies - sorry for not responding sooner!

Thanks eclipse, bechka and bubble2bubble!

I did go ahead with speech therapy for her, although she is not keen to go. The next session starts in September but now that she knows she will be going, and doesn't want to, I'm hoping she will start to be more aware of her speech and perhaps try to improve herself.

Thanks again for your helpful comments and again sorry that I didnt reply sooner.