Lynchpin Speech Therapy

Don’t wait and see.

Guidelines for speech sounds:

• 2-3 years: p, b, m, t, d, n, k, g, ng, h, w, f, y.
• 4 years: l, s, z, v, “SH”, “CH”, “J”
• 5 years: r, “ZH”, voiced “TH”
• 6 years: voiceless “TH”

Guidelines for language:

• 18 months: At least 10 words (can include animal/environmental sounds, ex. Moo, uh-oh, vroom)
• 24 months: At least 50 words, and starting to put two words together.

Signs that your child is a gestalt language processor:

• Uses rich intonation (‘intonation’ babies)
• Unintelligible long strings of language
• “Stuck single words”
• Delayed echolalia/scripts
• Can sing songs but doesn’t have any ‘words’
• Studying and replaying media clips

Authentic connection means that the relationships that we build are based on shared trust as well as acceptance and understanding of one’s true self. Building authentic connections is the foundation to making progress and learning new and difficult skills.

Our aim is to build autonomous communication skills. This means to be able to say what you want, to whom you want, however you want, when you want.

The goal of speech therapy is to help your child communicate effectively with other people across all environments. This may take the form of using gestures, simple signs, verbal speech, and Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC).

Some other common things speech therapists can help with:

• Nonverbal skills, such as signs or gestures
• Forming speech in a clearer way
• Communicating thoughts and feelings clearly
• Understanding and responding to questions
• Discerning facial expressions and their corresponding emotions
• Noticing and understanding body language
• Feeding and swallowing
• Stuttering