How to Teach Speech Sounds: Step By Step Guide

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Speech and Language Kids Podcast 34 min 1 speaker 6 chapters transcribed 15 hours ago

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What is the step‑by‑step guide for teaching a new speech sound at home?

Carrie Clark 0:00

Hey, everybody. This is Keri Clark, and you are listening to the Speech and Language Kids podcast, episode number five. This is the podcast with activities and resources for families of children with speech and language delays and disorders. Today, I'm going to be giving a step-by-step guide to teaching your child a new sound. Also, in the quick tip, I will be sharing how you can download my free e-book that gives you the step-by-step process for improving your child's speech at home. First, let's start with our news and updates. I have a very exciting update for you today. As many of you know, I have a store connected to my website that sells digital downloads of speech and language therapy materials that you can use at home or with your clients if you're a speech therapist to improve their speech and language skills.

Carrie Clark 0:41

I have a nice collection of games, cards, and e-books or informational resources, and I have decided to start giving away some of those for free. Each week, the members of my email newsletter list will receive a download code for one free product. They will be able to download the product for free and see how they like it. It will be a different product each week, so if you're not interested in the current one, you can always wait around and see what's coming next. Now, of course, I have to make money on the products to keep the business going. But my goal is really to be able to give at least some of it away for free. And hopefully you will see how great these products are and you'll want to buy more.

Carrie Clark 1:16

If not, you're not out any money and you got to try it out for free. This is my way of thanking my loyal readers who have signed up for my newsletter and also to try to help even more people than I'm currently able to help. I'm hoping this will be a huge success and that people will really like it. But I'm going to try it for a month or two and see how it goes. So if you're interested, be sure and head over to my website so you can sign up for the newsletter and the free download codes. You can find that link by going to www.speechandlanguagekids.com slash sign dash up. Alright, let's move into our feature segment today. I want to go over, give you an overview of how to teach your child a new sound at home so that you can work on this at home.

Carrie Clark 1:58

This is also good for speech therapists that are looking for maybe a different way than they're already trying to teach a child a new sound. It's just a basic approach. There are actually two approaches, two common approaches to teaching new sounds. One is the phonological approach and the other is the articulation approach. The phonological approach really looks at a whole class of sounds and changing a whole class of sounds at the same time. So, for example, you might work on long sounds with a child if they're collapsing all of their long sounds into shorter ones. So S becomes T. That would be a way that you can work on a whole class of sounds, the phonological approach. There's also the articulation approach, and that's the approach that I'm going to teach you about today.

Carrie Clark 2:37

Basically, that one targets one sound at a time, and you work that sound all the way from the smallest piece all the way up through being able to say it in conversation. And you kind of work through one sound at a time and move through that way. All right, so for the articulation approach, we're going to start at what's called the isolation level. And this just means that you're going to teach the child how to say the sound by itself. So if the sound you're working on is S, you're just going to teach them to say S. You're not going to try to get it in a word or anything like that. You just start on the single sound. So first what you need to do is you need to choose a sound. What I like to do for children, especially if it's parents that are working on it at home, I like to suggest that you start with the easiest sounds first so that your child has some success and then you can mix in some harder sounds as well.

Carrie Clark 3:27

I know you're thinking, OK, well, I don't know which ones are the easy sounds.

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Chapters

6 chapters

1 What is the step‑by‑step guide for teaching a new speech sound at home? 0:00–10:46 2 How do the phonological and articulation approaches differ for teaching sounds? 10:46–15:02 3 Which speech sounds are best to start with and how can I choose the easiest one for my child? 15:02–18:37 4 What specific cues should I use to teach the /b/ and /p/ sounds? 18:37–25:37 5 How can I help my child produce more complex sounds like /th/, /sh/, and /r/? 25:37–31:40 6 What are the next steps after isolation – moving from sounds to syllables, words, and sentences? 31:40–34:13

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Carrie Clark 32 min

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Speech and Language Kids podcast 1 speechandlanguagekids.com 6 Keri Clark 2 Articulation Station 2 e-book 3

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Recorded21 Mar 2013

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How to Teach Speech Sounds: Step-by-Step GuideIn this episode, I give a step-by-step guide how to teach sounds. Also, in the quick tip, I share how you can download my free e-book that gives you a step-by-step process for improving your child’s speech at home. Listen to the Teaching Speech Sounds Podcast Episode Here:No-Prep KitsMaterials and Training Videos for Every Sound ~ Inside The HubJoin The Hub (Free Trial Available)How to Teach Speech Sounds: In this episode you will learn the entire process of how to teach sounds to your child including: Phonological Approach Vs. Articulation Approach This is articulation, one sound at a time Isolation Choose sound Ages for sounds: http://www.speechandlanguagekids.com/how-to-teach-a-new-sound/ elicitation techniques: same link think about how you make it describe tongue, teeth, lips How to Teach Speech Sounds in Isolation: /b/ To produce the /b/ sound, use the following cues with your child. Watch My Mouth (this will help him see what your lips are doing) Put your lips together Make your lips pop Make your voice hum/Turn your voice on Help your child push his lips together with his fingers if he’s having trouble getting them closed /p/ If your child is having trouble with /p/, use the same cues as for /b/ but you will not tell her to turn her voice on. You can have her whisper the sound if she’s making it sound like a /b/ instead of a /p/. /w/ To make the /w/ sound, have your child start by saying “oo” like in “boo” and then slowly move the lips apart to say “uh”. It should sound like “oooouuh”. /m/ The /m/ sound is produced by pushing the lips together and humming. Have your child hold his lips closed and then ask him to hum or turn his voice on. The mouth should not open at all during this sound, all of the air should come out of the nose. /f/ Use these cues to get your child to say the /f/ sound: Bite your bottom lip (use a mirror to help your child see what she is doing) Hold your lip there and blow You may need to have your child use her finger to keep her lip in the right place. /v/ To produce the /v/ sound, use the same cues as /f/ except that you will need to have your child hum or turn his voice on. If your child is struggling with this, try having him hum a tune while biting his bottom lip with his top teeth. If your child is struggling to hold his lip with his teeth, have him use his finger to keep it in place. “th” To produce the “th” sound, have your child place her tongue between her teeth and blow. There are actually two versions of this sound, one with the voice on (like “the”) and one with the voice off (like “thumb”). Have your child hum if it’s the voiced one. /t/ To produce the /t/ sound, have your child tap her tongue right behind her top, front teeth. If your child is having trouble figuring out where to put her tongue, use these techniques to show her the right place: Touch the spot right behind the top, front teeth with a popsicle stick or sucker. Then tell her to put her tongue in the same spot. Put a sticky food, like peanut butter or marshmallow cream, on the spot right behind her top, front teeth. Then, have her lick it off. When you are describing that spot again, call it the sticky spot. /d/ To produce the /d/ sound, you can use the same cues as the /t/ sound, but your child will need to turn his voice on. Tell him this is the loud one. /n/ For the /n/ sound, your child will need to put her tongue in the same spot as the /t/ sound (see the cues mentioned for /t/). This time though, your child will hold the tongue in that spot while she hums or turns her voice on. If she is having trouble turning her voice on, have her hum a tune while holding her tongue in that position. /s/ For the /s/ sound, have your child put his tongue in the same place as /t/ (use the placement cues from /t/) but then blow air out. We call this the snake sound! If your child is sticking his tongue out too far, look in a mirror and tell him to keep his tongue behind his teeth. You can practice smiling so that his teeth are touching and there is no place for the tongue to peak out. /z/ For the /z/ sound, use the same cues a /s/ but this time your child will need to hum or turn her voice on. You can have her practice turning her voice on by humming a tune while saying the /s/ sound. /l/ For the /l/ sound, have your child slowly move his tongue up to the /t/ spot and back down again. While he’s doing this, have him hum or turn his voice on. “y” To produce the “y” sound, have your child start by saying “ee” like in “bee” and then slowly open the mouth to say “uh”. It should sound like “eeeeeuuuhh”. “sh” I call this the quiet sound. To make this sound, have your child form her lips into a little circle and blow. If your child is saying /s/ instead of “sh”, ask her to pull her tongue back towards the back of her mouth. “zh” This is the sound heard at the end of the word “beige”. This one isn’t very common in our language but it’s produce the same way as “sh” except with the voice humming or turned on. “ch” This sound is produced by saying “t” and “sh” quickly together. This one is pretty difficult so don’t get frustrated if he can’t say it! “j” The “j” sound is made by saying the “d” sound and the “zh” sounds very quickly together. This may be another one that is best worked on by a speech-language pathologist “r” The /r/ sound is a very tricky sound to produce. There are actually two different ways of producing this sound, one with the tongue scooped like a bowl and one with it curved like a mountain. For each person, one of these ways will feel better than the other but you cannot force someone to say /r/ in the way that isn’t natural for them. What you have to do instead is figure out which way they do it best. The easiest way to do this is to listen for any words with /r/ that your child says well. For most children, there are a few words that they can say with a good /r/ already, you just have to be listening for them. Once you find that word, have your child hold out the /r/ in the word so she can feel what a good word sounds like. Then, try to find other words that use /r/ in the same way. For example, if your child can say “car” well, try first to get other words that end in “ar” like “bar” and “far”. Once your child can do those, move to words that are similar, like “aardvark” or “marshmallow” /k/ To produce the /k/ sound, your child will need to get his tongue to the very back of his mouth. If your child is having trouble finding the right place for his tongue, use some of these placement cues: Get a small sucker (like a dum-dum) or a popsicle stick. Gently push down the front of your child’s tongue so that it cannot rise up to say a “t” sound You can also push his tongue back slightly with the sucker or stick to move the tongue backward. Show him this on yourself first so he doesn’t get scared. Have your child lay on his back while saying this sound. Gravity may help him drop his tongue back. Using your thumb, gently push up and back on the soft spot on the bottom of your child’s chin. This may get the tongue back to the right position. /g/ The /g/ sound is produced the same way as the /k/ but with the voice turned on. /h/ The /h/ sound is produced by making puffs of air at the back of the mouth. Have your child pretend to pant like a dog to make this sound. How to Continue to Teach Speech Sounds Beyond Isolation: Syllables Use a rainbow or sound spider to pair the sound with a vowel Words Articulation Station App: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/articulation-station/id467415882?mt=8 Carrier Phrases (such as “I see ball, I see bat”). Sentences (Have your child make up his own sentences about each word) Structured conversation rote recall rapid naming Describing sequences story starters Recall past events Focused good speech time increasing duration and frequency Resources for Teaching Speech Sounds Inside The Hub:No-Prep Therapy KitsReady-to-Use Materials for Every Sound, Available Inside The HubJoin the Hub to Access (Free Trial)Teaching Speech Sounds CourseLearn strategies for eliciting all of the speech sounds as well as for carrying over sounds to conversation. Available Inside The Hub!Join the Hub to Access (Free Trial) Free Therapy Materials for Teaching Sounds: Check out the freebies that we have inside our Free Therapy Material Library! Operation Better Speech! Home Program for Teaching Sounds /f/ Speech Sound Home Program CV, VC, CVC, and CVCV Flashcards and Worksheets (For practicing speech sounds in shorter words) Click Here to Access the Freebies!About the Author: Carrie Clark, MA CCC-SLPHi, I’m Carrie! I’m a speech-language pathologist from Columbia, Missouri, USA. I’ve worked with children and teenagers of all ages in schools, preschools, and even my own private practice. I love digging through the research on speech and language topics and breaking it down into step-by-step plans for my followers. Connect with Me: The post How to Teach Speech Sounds: Step By Step Guide appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

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