Is your child getting frustrated because his/her speech cannot be understood? Depending on the extent of the speech difficulties, unclear speech can impact on how well a child can interact with their peers and adults. Here are some simple strategies anybody can use to successfully talk to children with unclear speech.

1. Ask them to show you/ draw it out

If your child is talking about something in the house, ask them to show you or take you to it. They can also use hand gestures to facilitate interaction.

If you are struggling to understand them and it is not within reach, you could ask them to draw it out for you.

2. Provide them with choices

Offering the child choices can make it easier for your child to communicate his/her wants. When they use the word to make the request, they will feel confident that they are able to communicate successfully.

3. Give them time to respond

A child who has a speech sound difficulty may need more time to express themselves and be understood. Avoid talking for them or filling in their sentences. Their confidence will grow if we give them time and lots of encouragement to keep trying.

4. Don’t correct them

The best thing parents can do for a child with speech sound difficulties is model the word/ sentence correctly. However, don’t insist on the child repeating the word correctly as this may be difficult for them.

For example

Child: “ tee bo tup!”

Mother: “Oh yes, I see the blue cup”

If your child has repeated the word several times and you still cannot understand them, don’t be afraid to say “sorry”, but you are finding hard to understand the word right now.

Just showing your child that you are interested in what they have to say and that you are trying to understand is the most important part. Just try your best!

Written by Tasneem Abdul Samad, Speech Pathologist.

What are categories?

A category is a group of items that share similar characteristics. Do you sort and organise the items in your pantry? That’s categorising and most of the time we categorise without knowing it. Categorising by shape, colour, texture, size, and function can be fun and engaging in everyday play.

Why is categorising and sorting important?

Categorising is important in language because it gives us a way to group our thoughts, process information, store and retrieve ideas, and describe items. We categorise based on similarities and differences.

How does it help language development?

• Help to increase vocabulary.
• Improves comprehension and retention as well as recall.
• Helps children create patterns and identify similarities and differences.
• Develops organizational skills.
• Helps interpret the environment and add meaning to objects and stimuli based on stored information.

How can you categorise at home:

• Sort toys or items at home by colour, size, shape.
• Preschool – animals, body parts, clothes, shoes, jewellery, names in alphabetical order, toys, food (vegetables, fruit) etc.
• School Age – snacks, drinks, sports, tools, instruments, holidays, school subjects etc.
• Read books and discuss the pictures (e.g. “does a chicken live on a farm, in the water or in the jungle?”)
• Pictures – Cut pictures from magazines (e.g. fruits – vegetables and fruits; animals – where they live)
• Start a collection – collect items of a certain colour, shape, function etc.

Written by Senali Alahakone, Speech Pathologist at De Silva Kids Clinic.

Phonological awareness refers to the ability to hear and manipulate the sound structure of language. This encompasses working with the sounds at the word, syllable and phoneme (sound) level. Phonemic awareness is a sub-skill of phonological awareness. It is the ability to hear and manipulate the smallest sounds in spoken words (phonemes). 

Phonological awareness is one of the best predictors of initial reading progress. The ability to hear and manipulate phonemes plays a role in the acquisition of reading skills. There is considerable evidence that the primary difference between good and poor readers lies in the good reader’s phonological processing ability.

Phonemic awareness teaches children to attend to sounds and primes their connection of sound and print. It provides a way to approach new words and helps children to understand that letters in words represent sounds.

Below are examples of phonological awareness tasks to try at home with your child.

Breaking words into syllables (syllable segmentation)

• I’ll clap the parts in ‘football’  foot / ball
• Show me the syllables in ‘magical’  ma / gi / cal

Rhyme Awareness & Production

• ‘Cat’, ‘hat’, do they rhyme?
• What else rhymes: ‘Hand’, ‘band’, and…?

Initial & Final Sound Identification

• What is the first sound in ‘pillow’?  /p/
• What is the last sound in ‘slept’?  /t/

Blending sounds into words

• • I’ll say the sounds, you tell me the whole word.

/f/ /a/ /n/ – fan 

/s/ /i/ /t/ – sit

/s/ /l/ /e/ /d/ – sled

/t/ /r/ /ee/ – tree

Segmenting words into sounds

• • I’ll say the word, you tell me the sounds in the word.

Fan – /f/ /a/ /n/

Sit – /s/ /i/ /t/

Sled – /s/ /l/ /e/ /d/

Tree – /t/ /r/ /ee/

Phoneme deletion

• Say ‘cat’. Now say ‘cat’ without the /k/.
• Say ‘fan’. Now say ‘fan’ without the /n/.

Written by Sumeyya Yilmaz – Speech Pathologist at De Silva Kids Clinic 

Every child loves bubbles. In our speech therapy sessions, bubbles are one of our favourite tools.

Here are a few ways you can use bubbles to develop language and speech:

Eye contact – Bubbles are a great way to increase eye contact by allowing the child to look at you in anticipation before you blow bubbles.

Speech – If your child has speech errors or require support with developing sounds, you can use bubbles to teach a sound such as /m/ for ‘more’ bubbles, /b/ for ‘bubbles’, /p/ for ‘pop’

Requesting – You can use bubbles to request by allowing the child to ask for ‘help’ when they need the lid of the bubble opened or when requesting for the adult to ‘blow’ the bubbles.

Vocabulary – Increase your child’s vocabulary bank by exposing him/her to many words such as:

· Nouns: bubbles, lid, fingers

· Describing words: big, little, small, giant, wet, tiny, fun

· Locations: up, down, on, under

· Actions: pop, gone, look, stomp/stamp, kick, find

· Questions: where, who’s turn

· Social: please, more

Turn-taking – Teach turn-taking by allowing your child to blow bubbles and then allowing him to wait his turn while you blow bubbles. Turn-taking skills are important for a child to learn for later conversational turn-taking.

Motivation – If you are working on a particular skill, you can use bubbles to increase motivation by allowing him to pop or blow bubbles at the end of each activity or after each turn.

Phrases – Bubbles can help increase phrase length:

· 2 word phrases – ‘more bubbles’, ‘bubbles up’, ‘blow bubbles’

· 3 word phrases – ‘more bubbles please’, ‘blow big bubbles’, ‘I want bubbles’, ‘bubbles go pop’

Written by Senali Alahakone – Speech Pathologist at DSKC.

What is it?

Emotion Coaching is a technique that helps children understand their feelings. When parents Emotion Coach, their children learn how emotions work and how to react to feelings in healthy ways. Emotion Coaching starts by recognising your child’s feelings. Many parents are able to see the positive emotions a child expresses, but drawing close attention to a child who is angry or sad can take some practice. 

While it takes effort to teach your child about feelings and appropriate behaviours, it is time well spent. Your relationship with your child will be stronger and your child will be more prepared for the challenges life can bring.

Here are the 5 steps of emotion coaching:

As restrictions ease, we now need to adjust to the new Covid ‘normal’. This can be difficult for children with ASD as they have had to adjust to the unprecedented events of COVID-19 and now need to adjust to the new ‘normal’.

What COVID ‘normal’ may look like now:

• Masks continue to be an ongoing requirement

• Hand sanitiser will continue to be a safety protocol.

• Queuing is now the norm when visiting health professionals or going to the shops.

• Public transport drivers wearing masks and gloves and social distancing on buses will make it look very different looks very different

• Holidays will not be the same with social distancing, activities being restricted, accommodation having their own rules.

• Gatherings whether it may be family and friends gather

ing, attending sports matches or parties have changed with social distancing.

• Schools have implemented their own safety precautions such as picking up students at the gate, not being able to drop your child off at their classroom, teachers wearing masks, children social distancing, using hand sanitiser etc.

• Working from home may continue for some parents which will be another adjustment for both parents and children.

• Dining out will look different as orders may be placed on phones rather than physical menus and social distancing measures will be in place.

• Hand sanitiser, gloves and masks will more than likely continue to be safety protocols. If you have not been taking your child out during this period of isolation, start practising using these items.

TIPS

• Visual schedules – helps the child understand expectations. You can create a visual schedule for places that you will go to and/or visual schedules for how and when to use hand sanitiser or masks.

• Social story – create a social story that will visually represent social situations and expected behaviours. Below is an example of a social story for social distancing: https://paautism.org/resource/social-distancing-social-story/

• Video – can be a great way to model expected behaviours and familiarise yourselves with what is going on outside of the home environment. This is an example of a great video about the Covid ‘normal’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86CuDvNIhbU • Call ahead – It is a good idea to call ahead to where you are going and ask what their expectations are as it will help you prepare your child.

• Create routines and keep them consistent

• Sensory Needs – Anticipate your child’s sensory needs and be prepared by slowing familiarising your child with them such as wearing a mask and using hand sanitiser. Provide positive re-enforcement and explain why they are necessary. Experiment with different types of masks and materials. Here is a great social story for wearing a mask: https://www.autism.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/I-can-wear-a-mask-1- 1.pdf

Written by Senali Alahakone – Speech Pathologist at De Silva Kids Clinic.

Using Blank Level questions to develop language skills

Blank level questions

Blank level questions are used to encourage language development and vocabulary. There are four levels of questioning which move from concrete concepts to abstract concepts.

Level 1: Matching Perception

The objects and pictures discussed are in the child’s immediate environment. Non-verbal responses, (such as pointing) or short response are appropriate.

Examples of questions:

• Find one like this
• What did you touch?
• What is this? (Pointing to objects)
• Who is this? (Point to person)
• What is the child doing?

Level 2: Selective Analysis of Perception

The objects and pictures continue to be in the child’s immediate environment (in front of them) however the child has to use their analysing skills to answer questions such as grouping objects, describing and understanding object functions.

Examples:

• What shape is it?
• How does it feel?
• Where is it?
• What do you use…..for?
• How are these different?
• Tell me what’s happening.

Level 3: Reordering Perception

These questions are more complex as the answers are not in the child’s immediate environment. The child is required to use their own knowledge and experiences to make predictions and make generalisations.

Examples:

• Find me one to use with this.
• What will happen next?
• What could she say?
• How are these the same?
• Show me the middle
• Which one is not..?

Level 4: Reasoning about perception

This level focuses on abstract language where the child is required to predict, problem solve and reason.

Examples:

• Why can’t we…?
• Why wouldn’t it…?
• Why is…made of…?
• What will happen if…?
• How can we tell…?

It is important to note that when reading a book with your child that there should be more comments and descriptions given by the parents compared to the questions asked. This will increase participation and engagement and the experience will be less likely to feel like a test for your child.

Written by Senali Alahakone – Speech Pathologist at De Silva Kids Clinic.

 Benefits of Reading

• Children become better at reading – practice makes perfect. 
• Improves concentration.
• Teaches children about the world around them
• Improves vocabulary and language skills.
• Develops a child’s imagination.
• Helps children to develop empathy by reflecting on the characters or situation. 

When choosing a book for emergent literacy development, you can choose books that consist of the following:

• A book that suits the age and language skills of the child.
• A book with colourful pictures.
• Sensory books – books consist of various textures.
• Books with rhyming words.
• Books that show actions.
• Books that make noises.

How to read

• Reading the book word for word is not necessary when your child is young. By talking about the pictures, you’re still helping in developing their understanding. 
• Read slowly and discuss the sounds/letters in words.
• Discuss the pictures in the book e.g. “Oh what a big green tree”
• Ask WH questions (who, where, what, when, why and how) e.g. “What do you think will happen next?”, “why is the boy feeling sad?”, “Where is the teddy going?”
• Relate pictures/situations to personal experiences e.g. “That blue bike looks like your bike”
• Discuss the sequence of the book e.g. “First the boy went to the market, then he went to his friend’s house”.
• Re-read the book if your child is interested in that book. 

Examples of books 

• Dr Seuss Books – Rhyming and repetition
• Picture Books (e.g. Hungry Caterpillar) – Nouns

Written by Senali Alahakone – Speech Pathologist at De Silva Kids Clinic.

STANDARD SCORES
– Children’s scores are converted to standard scores so that they can be compared to scores of children of the same age
– Most tests have an average standard score of 100.
– Increments of 15 are used to separate the population into “average,” “below average,” and “above average” sections
– If your child receives a score between 85 and 115, it is considered to be within the average range. This is why the curve is higher for this section because most people fall in the average range

PERCENTILE RANKS
– Percentile ranks are given as an easy way to compare your child to other children his or her age
– A percentile rank of 16 for example, means that your child falls within the 16th percentile. In other words, it means that your child scored the same or higher than 16% of children the same age who took the same test
– Percentile ranks are not the same as percent of correct answers on a test

Marisa Donnoli – Psychologist at De Silva Kids Clinic

Screen time is time spent in front of a screen (e.g. television, phone, ipad/tablet, computer, video game device)

An excess amount of screen time can increase the risk of:
• Inconsistent sleep – may have trouble falling asleep or maintaining a regular sleep schedule.
• Problems with behaviour and attention – excessive screen time can lead to difficulties in school, attention problems, hyperactivity and behavioural issues.

Language Development
Children learn to talk and communicate through interactions with other people. The first several years of life are crucial for your child’s language development. It is when their brain is the most receptive to learning new language. The research has shown that increasing screen time can have an impact on speech and language acquisition and may also be linked to attention problems, short-term memory problems, and reading problems. All of which can play into your child’s ability to learn language as well.

Educational Videos
Of course there are educational videos such as those that teach language skills (e.g. sign language, vocabulary) however videos do not replace face-to-face interactions where they learn non-verbal body language and appropriate social skills.

Instead of Screen Time you can:
• Sing songs (i.e. nursery rhymes)
• Read a book
• Play with your child’s favourite toy, board game, puzzle
• Make a craft project, colour a picture
• Play in the yard, go to the park, go for a walk, ride bikes
• Go for a car ride and talk about what you see
• Go to the library and look for books on a topic that interests your child
• Teach your child a new skill
• Have a playdate
• Cook something in the kitchen together or plant some seeds in the garden

Written by Senali Alahakone – Speech Pathologist at De Silva Kids Clinic.