It can be hard to decide if your child needs to see a speech language pathologist, or more commonly known speech therapist, because the range of “normal” is very wide. You also need to make sure you’re not comparing your child with other children the same age because while other children may sound better than your child, they may not be as physically coordinated.
Speech therapists work on preventing, assessing, diagnosing and treating speech issues. We also deal with language, social communication, cognitive-communication and swallowing problems in children and adults. Speech therapists will help your child with talking, speech and communication skills and are trained with the right skills to help build and expand speech. We can work with children whose speech is affected by delays to more complex disorders like autism, hearing impairments, motor speech disorders, Down’s syndrome and other developmental delays.
1. Stuttering is a communication disorder that will affect the fluency of speech. Stutterers have breaks in the normal flow of speech that usually starts in childhood. We all have these disfluencies that are completely normal but when there are too many, it can have an effect on the ability to communicate. You will notice repetitions, interjections, prolongations and blocks in speech. You may also see other behaviors like tension in the jaw, face, neck and shoulders along with eye blinks, nose flaring and other abnormal facial gestures. Some children will even stomp their feet or jerk their arms, hands, legs and feet. The speech therapist will teach your child ways to control these behaviors which will increase their speech fluency.
2. Articulation skills and intelligibility. Articulation is the ability to physically move the tongue, lips, jaw and palate. These are known as the articulators to make the sounds that are called phonemes. To make the b sound for example, there is a way these work together to produce the sound. The way people understand your speech is called intelligibility. If for any reason your child’s articulation skills are affected, the intelligibility will be not be at the same level as other children the same age. The speech therapist will develop ways to help your child by coming up with ways to make the sounds or patterns of sound that they are having problems with. This will help their speech and therefore their intelligibility.
3. Language is symbolic. Speech uses physical motor abilities to talk. In the English language, these symbols can be words that are either written or spoken. We even use gesture symbols like waving to indicate saying good bye, shrugging our shoulders to let others know that we may not know something or raising our eyebrows to let others know we’re surprised. This is called expressive language that can let us know what our children are saying. Speech therapists can provide ways for your child to learn new words and the way they need to be put together to form phrases and sentences also known as semantics and syntax. This will make it easier for your child to communicate with others.
Your child may need a speech therapist if it’s hard for people to understand what they’re saying or if your child has difficulty when they’re trying to say something. Contact ENT Specialists for an appointment if you’re concerned about your child’s speech.
