Speech

[Sux2buthen]

My four year old has a great vocabulary, loves to talk around the clock and is confident, friendly and outgoing.
Her only difficulty (not that she finds it a difficulty it's everyone else) is her speech. There are many sounds she doesn't say correctly. I understand her most of the time and with time others do too.
She was referred to a speech assessment with a speech therapist and she shocked me because she said she's not sure if she has a speech/ sound disorder. So speech therapy through school planned etc.
school have said she is going to have specialised/ specialist help but this was said quickly in passing so I have no information.
Is there anyone here that has experience with this kind of thing?
I don't understand what's caused this bless her and I don't know if she's having standard support or if it's more serious than that.
Thanks

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I don't think you should worry too much. There is a huge range of speaking ability and some children do not speak or speak clearly until very late compared to others. Some children genuinely have difficulties; others just need a few pointers. If her school has arranged a few sessions, that sounds positive.

When DD1 was that age, or slightly younger, many people found her difficult to understand. This sorted itself as time went by. At one stage, as she used her own word, similar to the right one, I did say quite bluntly that everyone else pronounced it ... she changed her pronunciation. The final piece, as I remember, was teaching her to say 'th', as in thing, correctly.

My niece had some delayed speech, perhaps in part due to having an older sibling. She saw a speech therapist a few times. Apparently, animal noises (baa, neigh) count as words. Also, her overly ambitious mother sometimes missed genuine words/speech.

I'd never noticed there was a problem, I just assumed it was little kid speak. Now she's speaking in more complicated sentences I can really hear it, I hadn't realised very few people can understand her bless her.

@Sux2buthen I just wondered how your DD is doing now? My 4yo is very similar.

Thankyou for asking 🙂she's 5 and a half now and over the last year presumably from being at school the difference is dramatic. Much clearer and has now got most of her sounds.
There's a couple she's not there yet with but school are working with her and progress has been great. Just as well because her second speech appointment is yet to materialise!
So I would say it's early days at 4 still🙂 fingers crossed you find the same