Not sure about whether to go for speech therapy

[rebeccaw]

My son is in Year 1 at school & doing ok. He's been a little slow to get going with his reading but this seems to be par for the course with little boys.

His vocabulary is excellent, but he doesn't always pronounce words very clearly and his teacher is suggesting he goes to see a speech therapist. She also thinks this will help him with reading as he will 'get' phonics better if he pronouces words more clearly. Personally I think he's just not interested in phonics; nothing to do with pronunciation.

So I'm not sure about the speech therapist... I don't want him to start thinking he has a problem. He's very confident and chatty at the moment. On the other hand, I don't want to be another couple of years down the line and it still be an issue. anyone had any experience of this and whether speech therapy is a good/bad thing to do?

I think if the teacher is suggesting speech therapy, you would be wise to be guided by that.

My friend's DS, also in Year 1 (and also confident and chatty!), has unclear speech and is now having speech therapy. As an outsider to the family and having known her DS for the whole of his life, I picked up much earlier than she did that he was going to need speech therapy but hesitated to say anything because if ever I did mention his speech (gently!), she would brush it off and say that he would catch up. Now he is having quite intensive speech therapy and has to do lots of verbal exercises for it, and friend has said that he does get bullied by older children because he can't communicate clearly

What I'm trying to say is, putting therapy off in the hope that his speech will get better by itself isn't always the best solution.

I don't want to hijack the thread at all but this exact same question has been on my mind this week. I plan to ask DS2's teacher about this tomorrow at parent's evening.

He is 7 and has a superb vocabulary and his intonation is great when reading and speaking. However, now he is older I have noticed (well, I noticed before but put it down to immaturity and gaps in teeth, etc.) that he does not pronounce several words correctly. For 'the' he says 'v' and still says bsketty for spagehtti plus some others I'd have to hear again to remember what they are. It's fairly subtle so am unsure whether SALT is needed but I tend to think so. He is completely understandable but that isn't the whole issue I guess.

Does anyone have the criteria for SALT involvement?

I would say it would be the sensible thing to give your permission for your son to see the Speech Therapist. It may turn out that after she sees him for an assessment of his speech that she decides he doesn't need any therapy.
On the other hand, if he does need it, it's better to get it under way as early as possible (apart from anything else, you may well find that there are fewer resources available for speech therapy as your son gets further up the school).

And you might well find that your son loves going out of class for 20 minutes to do something fun with a Speech Therapist. In my experience, most children enjoy it!

Forgot to add that I agree with other posters who are essentially saying there is no harm in having an initial assessment with a speech therapist. No harm can be done, and in school these days there is such a raft of extra services that great numbers of children go off and do work with support workers and so on at varying times on a lesson to lesson basis so there should be no stigma attached.

Thanks guys; I think it can be very difficult to spot when your own child has a problem because of course you are so tuned in to their speech you don't always hear things. hobbgoblin, your son's misprononciations sound very similar to my DS. Our school has a speech therapist who comes in once a week and the class teacher asked her to sit with DS to see whether it was worth a referral - so it might be worth asking the class teacher or head what resource is in school for an initial assessment.

In the old days children who had articulation errors invariably grew out of them. We seem to pathologise everything these days. It is common practice here in Australia for teachers to refer children to speech therapy when they are not learning to read, passing on the problem to another quasi-professional.

Given that most speech therapists are in private practice, they are only too delighted to be given these referrals.

Ds1 had speach therapy. He was 'lazy' at saying certain words.

We didn't make a big deal about it and was matter of fact about it. We always made the appointments for out of school time.

It did his speech the world of good and didn't alter his confidence one bit.

Malaleuca what research supports this notion that a majority grew out of their speech difficulty?

To some extent I agree that there is a growing over reliance upon diagnoses and lesser support thereafter particularly within the behavioural spectrum of problems, but I have seen no evidence personally to support what you say about individuals growing out of their difficulties in the main. Have you?

LOL at the idea of DS2 'growing out' of verbal dyspraxia

None of DS2s peers have grown ut of their speech problems. I just wish they got as much speech therapy as they need

I didn't think the picture was that different - but I stand to be corrected if the UK has the bulk of its speech therapists in the public rather than the private sector.

Maybe I am wrong about the 'old days' but I don't recall 'huge suffering' over minor speech defects (I would not include stuttering in this category, which probably did trigger bullying). I have had children with fairly severe articulation problems over the years but all grew out of it by Y1/2, whether they had ST or not, but hey, just my opinion.

I understood that we were talking about minor speech articulation problem ("doesn't always pronounce words clearly")

but this child is in year one mal - the age by which you said children tended to have grown out of this?

a child having minor articlation issues at three or four is very different from consistent problems in year one ( age 6/7)

If teachers is suggesting speech therapy it would be free and part of school services. So over diagnosis gravy train theory isn't applicable

Well, I indeed stand corrected regarding my misquotation. However, you are thus saying that even more than the majority outgrew their problem. You are saying that everyone did!

And on what basis?

I know I am nit picking, but the under-resourced secondary support in schools really doesn't need to be undermined in this way, and attitudes like this do have a negative impact on uptake of services, awareness of services, and the success and funding of such services.

In my 30+ years as a teacher every child has 'grown out' of minor articulation errors - especially if they are pointed out and child is taught to correct mispronunciation!

Also in my experience is that many adults tolerate - yes even encourage spronunciations as cute.

But hey, it's only my opinion.

No probably not! I suspect the original poster will be persuaded by the recommendations of all on here and the teacher to employ a speech therapist to correct her child's mispronunciations. So I'll better butt out!

How extraordinary.
In your 30 years every child who has mispronounciation problems at year 1 and older have then 'grown out' of them.
And they were mainly being encouraged by parents who thought they were cute

In my 14 years experience, every child with speech problems at year one continues to have problems now.
And most parents I know ( including me) have been spending most of their days correcting, modelling or encouraging correct pronounciation.

it may only be your opinion. I guess as the parent of a child with speech problems and hearing how that is often the parents fault as they value cute over correct, I find it a bit wanky

I would definately agree to go with it, much better to have help earlier than later, where speech is concerned. Maybe not at toddler stage as might grow out of it but def school age. And, as someone said above, children go out of class for all sorts of things

Rebeccaw - my daughter had a year of fatastic speech therapy over pre-school and reception (so a little younger than your son)She had significant pronounciation problems as all her sounds came from the back of her mouth. She is now in year 1 and apart from a slight lisp you would never know she'd had a problem. I think that without the therapy she would have really struggled with phonics and it some ways it really helped - she could give you a whole list of words beginning with 't' and had hours of practice blending sounds.
Without external help, I don't think she would have grown out of her problems - we had to train her mouth to make the correct shapes for each sound.

Hobgoblin - My daughter couldn't say spaghetti either - it came out Bejeggi. When she had her final speech assessment she proudly stood in the middle of the room and announced 'I can say spaghetti - spaghetti, spaghetti, spaghetti' I was so proud of her!!

I have seen massive improvements made to children's speech because of help from a speech therapist....really don't think you have got anything to lose with this one, OP.

It's almost impossible to get speech therapy here and it certainly wouldn't be available for a child with a good vocabulary and only minor problems with pronouncing words so I would jump at the chance even if it is just to rule out that this is a concern.