Teens

Pre-teens/Teens:

School-aged (elementary through high school-aged) students are affected by a variety of communication difficulties.  Speech-language pathology therapeutic intervention can help your school-aged child.

Oral-motor therapy as part of a comprehensive treatment approach is often not addressed in speech therapy, because its efficacy has been disputed.  Char Boshart uses Motor Activities for Children in Articulation Therapy (MA-CAT), a program I learned about at one of her coferences, purchased and implemented 15 years ago.  I have seen countless lives improved because of her approach to remediation.  Most recently, a 20 year old student who had a lifetime of speech therapy, was able to master vocalic and pre-vocalic /r/, voiceless and voiced "th", /s/ and /l/ by adding the MA-CAT to his therapy and with practice on his own to facilitate improved tongue, lip and jaw disassociation (ability to move independently of one another), strength, range of motion and awareness regarding position in the mouth.  I have seen this program benefit middle school and high school aged students who were going to be discharged from therapy because they were not "stimulable" for or able to produce /r/.  With the use of the MA-CAT, these students became stimulable for the target sounds and were able to produce not only consonant, but vocalic /r/ including; "ar", "or", "ur", "er", "air", "ear".

Lisps are also improved or eliminated using the MA-CAT,  Call me today to set up an appointment to see if your pre-teen/teen can benefit from this approach to therapy. (610) 563 6613 or via email at amcfalls7@gmail.com

Articulation and oral motor skills as discussed above is not the only difficulty teens may have:

 Language delays/disorders may be addressed in speech and language therapy.

Voice disorders:  A consult with an ENT (Ear, Nose and Throat doctor) will be needed to address voice concerns.  When pathology is identified or ruled out, we will proceed with identifying a plan of care during the evaluation process and move forward with therapy.

Fluency/Stuttering:  A community centered approach is used at Speech Wonders, LLC.  After completing an evaluation, treatment is initiated and includes education of others in the student's community while helping the student to become the expert on stuttering.  We equip your child to know a variety of strategies for increased fluency, but also in how to deal with the responses to stuttering from others.

Free Printables for Stuttering

 Social/pragmatic differences are also targeted in individual therapy.  Role play and use of videos and a variety of creative strengths can be engaged in to facilitate improved understanding and use of strategies in social communication settings.

For more challenging communication difficulties, Augmentative Alternative Communication (AAC) devices may be assessed and utilized as part of a comprehensive treatment approach.

In working with teens, it is imperative that we partner with them in identifying priorities for treatment, areas of concern and are engaged in the treatment plan.  We identify areas of interest and strength that your teen already has and work with those to learn together in a fun and engaging way.  For example, a middle school student that I recently worked with was learning about Expected and Unexpected behaviors.  She enjoys  making movies, so she was able to put together a movie in which she and different characters acted out the expected and unexpected behaviors in a variety of situations.

http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/schoolsFAQ.htm

Please click on the link below for some fun information for your teenager!

http://kidshealth.org/teen/index.jsp?tracking=T_Home