Speech Therapy

Articulation

Therapists work closely with clients and their families through a hierarchy of levels, starting with correctly producing a certain speech sound in isolation and subsequently moving through all levels until the particular sound is considered to be mastered. 

As children begin communicating, it is normal for them to make errors within their speech and it is not a cause for concern. Once a child turns 3, unfamiliar listeners (anyone other than immediate family members and close friends)  should be able to understand about 75% of the child’s speech and closer to 100% by their 4th birthday. If this is not the case, the child may be a good candidate for speech therapy.  

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Motor Speech

Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS) is a motor speech sound disorder in which a child’s brain has difficulty coordinating the oral movements required to produce speech sounds.  Acquired Apraxia of Speech (AOS) is also a motor speech sound disorder that affects adults often following a stroke. Muscle weakness is not to blame for CAS or AOS. 

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Dysarthria

Dysarthria, which can be diagnosed in children and adults, is a speech sound disorder in which the muscles required for speech production are too weak. This leads to poor oral motor control and coordination.  Dysarthria often causes slurred or slow speech that can be difficult to understand.

 

Voice

Therapists work closely with clients and their families on a series of vocal cord exercises and preventive measures to eliminate, improve, or prevent voice disorders (i.e. hoarseness, vocal cord paralysis/parisis, laryngitis, voice breaks). 

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Fluency
A person may be diagnosed with a fluency disorder if they have trouble speaking in a fluid or flowing way. More specifically he/she may repeat whole words or parts of a word more than once, pause at unexpected times within a sentence, speak rapidly and jam words together, or use fillers such as “um” or “uh” frequently. These changes in speech are called disfluencies. Although most people have a degree of “normal” disfluencies within their speech, those who are diagnosed with a fluency disorder, speaking and being understood may be a constant struggle.