What can I do to help DS sound certain words?

[PeggyL]

My DS was 4 in July and started school last week. He can't pronounce his 'th's and says 'f' instead, for words like thank you, Thursday, three. I'm trying to help him say it the right way but it's not working, has anyone got any suggestions or tips to help? Thanks

Don't for him to use the correct pronunciation. Just model the correct pronunciation after he makes a mistake. It is still very young for these speech sounds. Yes, many children will have them but he is not alone and our isn't unusual.

You could play some auditory discrimination games to help him hear the correct sound and how is differs from the f sound. So posting pictures into one of two shoeboxes - one for the and the other for f.

"one for th" not the

dd/ds got told that words like 'the', 'three', etc were 'cheeky' words as you have to stick your tongue out to say them. Get him to try sticking his tongue out at the start of the word and see if it helps

Quite normal IME at four. Don't worry about it, he'll get there. My almost 6 year old still doesn't really say th properly but he knows the difference between th and f because of phonics teaching.

Great tips and reassured now, thanks guys x