learning aids

[concerned dad]

My son is 3 yrs, 4 months old. His hearing tested in the summer. He had water in his middle ear and had tubes put in. We tested his hearing again last month and it is normal. We are concerned because there have been only minor improvements in his speech. He is on a waiting list for speech therapy and is expected to start in Jan. of Feb.

He understands everything we say, and uses charades to answer. He can make the individual sounds of the alphabet. Larger words and sentences get slurred together and cannot be understood. He has been assessed by a speech pathologist at a private clinic. For $150 they said, "His speech is delayed" I knew that. They also said they could set up a program for us to do at home but that would cost about $500. That's out of our price range.

We would like to start helping him ASAP. We feel helpless/negligent if we just waited until Feb. Can you recommend any on-line resources or books with activities so we can start working with him at home?

Thanks

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

No, I can't. Perhaps one of the readers of the Forum will know of something. However, my inclination would be to communicate with him in your normal fashion, try to encourage his saying words (vs. responding immediately to his gestures), and wait for guidance from the speech therapist. You are not going to accomplish anything of significance in the short time available.

[KatieDee]

Hello:

I just wanted to pass along my experience with a hearing and speech delayed child.  My son had many ear infections and constant fluid before he entered kindergarten.  By the time it was decided to put tubes in his ears the fluid had been in there long enough to become "thick as jelly".  Not surprisingly, all hearing tests, including the ones to see how well the ear drum vibrates, showed he had no hearing prior to the tubes.  At the age of 18 months he had the surgery and his speech at that time was just repetition of sounds, mostly gutteral, but no intelligible words could be understood.  The ENT put the tubes in and sucked out what fluid he could but said that he couldn't get it all since it was so thick.  We were concerned about his speech and ability to "catch up" with other children his age when he started school.  Well, over the next three years he had no speech therapy since we were told by his pediatrician not to worry, that he would catch up.  His speech had improved by the time he started school, but he still was not communicating very well.  Many words were still unintelligible and he had trouble forming sentences that made sense.  We could usually guess what he wanted at home, but his kindergarten teacher didn't have a clue.  So, he started speech therapy in the public school and had a wonderful speech teacher.  By the end of the school year he was up to speed with the other children his age.  So, even though we did not seek early speech intervention he was still able to learn those vital skills necessary for listening and speaking.  My advice to you would be not to worry if you aren't able to get speech therapy now, but to do some things at home in the meantime.  Some things that are helpful, which I'm sure you already do, are picture books.  Just simply pointing to the picture and saying the word and then encouraging your child to repeat that word is very helpful.  I have another son who had speech therapy when he was 5 at a university.  What was common in both therapies of my children was interactive play.  They were never forced to talk or made to repeat a word until they said it correctly, but there was plenty of encouragement through play modules they had set up which resulted in a natural desire to participate.  Speech therapy in the public school is free, but you might want to check with your local universities to see if they have a hearing and speech department where students are doing their internship.  These are closely supervised and I've had two experiences with these kind of programs and have been very happy.  Hope this helps.