Speech therapy!

[MarsLady]

Wee Weapon 2 (6) is in need of speech therapy. The lovely Haringey assessed him last year and the lucky lucky boy got 5 sessions. A year on they called and asked him to go in to be assessed again. Guess what? That's right readers, the lucky boy got another 5 sessions, only they sent me the letter telling me how important it was that he attended all the sessions the day after they started.

So... I'm a birth and postnatal Doula. Are there any SALTs out there who fancy doing a swap? My services for yours. I can't afford to go down the private route, if any one has any ideas of what I can do, I'd be most grateful. North or Central London based only (pure logistics)

His hearing etc is perfect. The ENT Consultant thinks he must have had glue ear when he was younger and that's why he has so many missing sounds. It's impacting on his reading. He has a huge vocabulary but people don't understand him.

Ta muchly!

is it "just" speech sounds he is missing?

how is his comprehension/use of language (other than mis-pronunciation)?

there are loads of people here with more knowledge than me on this, but I am sure there are loads of things you could be doing at home to help with speech sounds.

not my area really, as dd1 has a massive language dlay but near perfect pronunciation (other than "normal" mixing up of some sounds - l mostly)

I'll have a quick hunt through my resources and see what I find, and hope someone more helpful comes along soon

Have a look at the Nuffield Centre. Ask the SLT for books you can borrow on Oral dyspraxia or the Nuffield approach. Not saying your LO has this, but the exercises are good.

Be prepared to do the majority of therapy yourself. NHS SLT is crumbling away and deteriorating minute by minute, but they should at least be an expert or two that you can dip into and question to get going.

hth

"...only they sent me the letter telling me how important it was that he attended all the sessions the day after they started."
Oh!!! So typical! We had this too!!

Thank you!

Sorry to have been away from this so long. Did a couple of back to back births then went out dancing. Still recovering.

Sadly your find speech work comes down to doing yourself and lots of areas won't even se at 2.6

but try blowing bubbles through a straw blowing feathers or ping pong balls across the floor
Also try putting sprinkles or jam around his lips and getting him to lick of also as many loud and noisy things to blow that your ears can stand

Mars, don't overdo the blowing too much. Short sessions, otherwise your ds will get very dizzy

If you want to CAT me, I'm happy to see if I can help via email. I'll need to know a bit more about his speech.

I'm going away over easter weekend but back next week. I'll try to email a few ideas to you to do at home, if I can.

I'm an slt, although haven't worked for a few years!

If, in the meantime, you get an offer from someone who lives closer, that's great

Thanks daft! I don't have CAT but you can email me on lovelymarslady at aol dot com.

Okay..won't overdo the blowing!

Have emailed you

Oh, Marslady, I would JUMP at that swap...but am on the isle of wight...so not much use to you!!

Did the SLT provide you with a report of her/his assessment findings? They should have given some kind of findings report, detailing what assessment they used, and what the results mean for your child. Is it jut a pure speech sound problem, or are there problems with comprehension/ sentence construction?

daft... lost my internet connection for a while, but will email you this weekend. Thanks!