How to help 3yo pronounce his Ls and Rs

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My 3yo ds is talking a lot now, and while I can understand him it's becoming hard for others to get what he's saying sometimes because he pronounces his Ls and Rs as a W sound.

Are there exercises or games we could play to help him? We're not pressuring or correcting him as I don't want to dull his confidence but I also want to do what is best for him to set him up for school.

Ideas and experiences welcome please

He's so young and this is very common. Just keep modelling how to say the sounds correctly. Majority of children correct this by age 6.

Agree with poster above. The /l/ sound often doesn't appear til nearer 5yo and /r/ can be as late as 6 or 7yo.

Just modelling correct pronunciation in general speech is enough, he will get it when his voice and mouth are developmentally ready.

Speech and language therapist here- can confirm the above, just model correct pronunciation. As another poster said these sounds usually correct around 6/7yrs. Imature motor control of articulators is usually the reason and will develop with age. Your child is presenting with "gliding" a very common error process, if this is the only error your child makes they wouldn't meet threshold for SaLT and are considered within norms for thier age.

Thanks so much for your replies, it's really put me at ease. I was hoping this would be the case, so will enjoy the cuteness of his speech imperfections a while longer

My daughter had difficulty with these sounds too. She and her sister also have names with L sounds in so not being able to say her own name or sister's name properly was a bit awkward.

She did have a few speech therapy sessions at school when she went into year 1. Those sessions helped a lot. Even though I'd been trying to help her myself for a couple of years the therapist achieved a lot more in only a few sessions than I'd been able to.

Your 3 year old is still very young. It may well sort itself out without any intervention. If it's still an issue at age 5 or 6 then push for hearing tests and speech therapy then.

My son had this same problem at 6. SLT played a game with him which we now play at home with 2 tubs and a pack of toy dinosaurs. One tub is for R words and the other tub for in our case W. So he was pronouncing 'rings' as 'wings' etc. He says a word and I pop the dinosaur in the box corresponding to the correct letter.
If he tries to say ring incorrectly and it comes out as wing, I pop it in the W box...he doesn't like it going in the wrong box so he takes extra care to pronounce it clearly and wins his dinosaur when he correctly says R.
Hope I've explaing it clearly! It's worked wonders.
Worked for his L sounds too, lollipop vrs wollipop, he is determined to get them in the right boxes. She also gave him a mirror to practice tongue placement.

Hi @Greyskies86, hope you don't kind my jumping on itv a question!

My son, recently turned 3, also struggles with his S's.

Is this cause for concern?

No not at all, at this age motor control is still developing and some sounds are harder to articulate than others, /s/ for example requires the speaker to constrict airflow through the teeth and alvelor ridge while the tongue shapes upwards to create the hissing noise you hear with /s/. That's a lot for a little mouth with poor motor control to do whilst making other sounds in conjunction! Continue modelling correct sounds within normal speech and make sure not to draw too much attention to it or correct, pronunciation will come with time.

Thanks @Greyskies86, much appreciated