I have four children that have had speech delays and around 4 years old I used a home based speech therapy program called Straight Talk: A Parent's Guide for Correcting Childhood Mispronounciations, which is the first book and Straight Talk: A Parent's Guide to Language Development, the second book, from Marisa Lapish and Tom and Sherry Bushnell, published by the National Challenged Homeschoolers Associated Network. Here is the website that I bought it from: http://www.nathhan.com/straight.htm. It really worked for us and was easy for me to use.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Home Based Speech Therapy
A question came up this weekend after my God's Wildflowers talk about parents administering speech therapy in homeschool setting. I knew I had seen something about this on the Internet but couldn't remember where. Well, now that I'm home, I've found an old email that addressed the issue. I hope the person who asked the question reads my blog:
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2 comments:
After several years of speech therapy, my daughter and I decided to try it at home. We bought SpeechWorks software by Trinity Software, Inc for $75. It allows the student to target specific speech problems.
The student listens to the computer and then repeats what the computer "said" into the microphone. The computer then plays back both the computer's pronunciation followed by the student pronunciation. This allows the students to really hear how they sound compared to "normal" pronunciation. The lessons range from very simple (pronouncing individual letter sounds) to moderate (pronouncing whole words) to advanced (pronouncing sentences) and even has assignments for working professionals who may need to reduce accents and so the sentences contain commonly used jargon based on the type of career the user has.
This really worked for my daughter, as, after years of speech therapy, she'd already learned correct lip and tongue positions for each sound...it was then just a matter of remembering to do it and putting that correct pronunciation into everyday speech.
I hope this helps!
This book might be beneficial for a child who has minor articulation errors, but it is important to remember that Speech Pathologists are highly trained in the area of speech sound and phonological disorders to help children learn how to place their articulators for correct production as well as teaching children helpful tricks to self monitor their speech. So, speech therapy may not be rocket science, but it defintely is not for the average parent. Speech therapists also provide home programming for parents to follow as the child progresses in speech therapy sessions. Schools are not the only means of speech therapy. A parent can also seek out speech therapy through outpatient facilities and/ or home based services. It would be worth while to check in with a professional before trying to become a speech/ language pathologist over night.
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