Articulation Issues-Speech Therapy?

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My daughter who is almost 8 has articulation issues. I have never worried too much about it but now that her peers are speaking clearly she obviously stands out because of it. She is having problems with r's, f's, and th's. She has been seeing a speech therapist for 6 months now. The therapist assessed her articulation at an age equivalent of 4y 4m. My problem is that my daughter hates the therapy, we haven't seen any improvement, and it has greatly disrupted our routine. I just don't know if it's worth it. My daughter doesn't hear the difference in her speech vs others and doesn't want to try.

Is this something that she will grow out of in time or does it require the speech therapy? If your child has/had articulation issues did they improve on their own? It has also caused problems with her spelling as she will spell things how she says them-such as "star" she will spell "staw" (like she says it).

Any input from similar situations would be appreciated. Thanks.

There are several different things that you've raised in your post. The first thing I would urge you to do is to have your daughter's hearing checked by an audiologist (not just someone at school, or even at the doctor's office). This is very important, because if your daughter is not hearing sounds properly, she will not be able to correct her speech optimally, and it is possible that there is a medical issue interfering with her speech.

Do you know what it is that your daughter dislikes about her speech therapy sessions? Is it the activities in which she is engaged? the therapist? the time when she is there/something she is missing because of the timing of her therapy? When my daughter had speech therapy (outside of school), most of the sessions were without me, but I was brought in for a very small portion of the session, so my daughter could "show off" what they had been doing, and I could see what was being worked on and support it at home. One of the things I was always impressed with, was that the therapist was extremely good at engaging my daughter by being enthusiastic and doing fun things, and switching up activities so that it was always "exciting" for her. This is something that all the good pediatric therapists I've seen tend to do - the speech, occupational and physical therapists. If your daughter isn't "clicking" with the speech therapist, it may be time to find a new speech therapist - but probably not to give up on speech therapy.

i and all 3 of my kids have at one time been diagnosed with a speech impairment, all of us with articulation issues.

with my kids, they all started ST between the ages of 4 and 6. my oldest had a *very* severe impairment, it took 6 1/2 years of school based ST to fix. my middle son is still attending ST, has been since last spring, he has a lisp and problems with combination sounds (th, sh, ch, etc). my youngest has a severe impairment, started ST last spring, and is showing good progress so far.

for me, i didnt start ST until i was 10, and i did 2 years to correct a failure to produce the R sound like your daughter (my name is Erin, first 11 years of my life everyone i met thought my name was Ellen). i can tell you that it didnt go away at all for me by the time i was 10. my issue was my jaw was not reaching far enough forward to produce the correct sound. i did ST twice a week for two years just to produce that one sound on my own.

i think some speech issues correct themselves, but not all. you can still find adults now with speech impairments, altho most others have probably been resolved by receiving ST through the public school system.

try to find out why your daughter doesnt like the ST. could it be due to her AS? i know my youngest and my SO both hate to be watched, and a therapist who watches them is going to make them extremely uncomfortable and anxious. also see how the ST is done, sometimes its done with multiple students at a time, she may be reacting to being around the other kids.

I agree that you should look into the hearing test.
also with looking into why she doesn't like ST
My son was in ST in 1st grade and 2nd grade.
At first he was not making any progress, hated the ST and got to the point he would cry when it was time for ST.
Come to find out ST was during Story Time and Picking out any prizes you had earned.
His mind was on what he was missing and so he didn't pay attention or do the ST activities very well which made the ST very stressful and he was getting a negative reaction from the therapist. So he hated ST.
Once they changed the time for ST he flourished and no longer needed ST by the end of 2nd grade.

If you don't find out anything with the hearing test and looking closer at therapy you might want to get some opinions at school as to the benefit of her staying in ST vs the negatives it is causing. Since it does affect her spelling I would try everything I could to keep her in ST. If it is a possiblity you may want to look at a different ST setting outside of school if all else turn.
good luck

Thanks for the replies.

My daughter is very sensitive and easily frustrated so I think she doesn't like speech because it implies she's speaking wrong (which irritates her-she doesn't want to be criticized) and also the repetitive nature is annoying to her. In 6 months I don't think they've gotten her to realize the difference in the sounds-which was the goal on day one! They do play games which she likes but the games are tied to tasks she must complete and once she figures out she's being "manipulated" like that she will just shut down. She can frequently get into power struggles with therapists. They also put Qtips (flavored) in her mouth and she detests them-says she can taste them all day and sometimes the next day.

She does get to miss 30 minutes of school (which she loves) but it is a private therapy office (she doesn't receive services through the public school and is in private) and we have to wake up very early to get to the appointment so she is usually tired. She's grumpy in the mornings! It is so hard to get her back to school after the sessions because we have disrupted our "routine" that transitions her into class in the mornings (she has separation anxiety).

Unfortunately, I live in a small town and this is the only pediatric ST within 30 miles. I am torn between helping her myself at home and letting her grow out of it and suffering through the therapy they say she "needs". She has had typical hearing tests (headphones with tones) and they said she did fine. I have not been concerned about her hearing although she does have sensory modulation issues-so one day the sound of a pencil dropping to the floor will startle her and the next she seems to seek loud sounds. The speech issues are consistent. My brother had this articulation issue and they just tape recorded (back in the day of cassette recorders ) him so he could hear how he sounded but that hasn't worked with my daughter. Maybe she just needs to get a little older?

I am not really sure my opinion will help anything but I have a child who has undergone speech therapy for 10 years. We have only recently come to the aspie diagnosis but her speech diagnosis initially was profound phonological speech disorder which over the 10 years has been bumped to a severe level instead of profound. I can't even list all of the errors she makes in her speech and there are a couple of sounds she has never, ever even made correctly one single time. I do however think that however unsuccessful our therapy time was regarding her speech it was necessary if only to get her to realize where the difficulties lie when other people are listening to her. I made it a point at a very young age with my daughter to expose her to as much language and vocabulary as I could and would always tell her if someone doesn't understand what you say don't get frustrated just use different words until they get it. She was very good at that and has a huge vocabulary which I attributed to my teaching her, but now I realize that she absorbed those words so quickly and easily it was probably more due to the aspie in her not just my teachings. Anyway, from the time she was little I felt like I was her outside communication link to the world, and while I worked on speech with her daily, I never corrected her when she was trying to communicate because I didn't want her to build up walls of resentment between us regarding the communication. I modeled good speech and would sometimes point out what I heard so she would be aware that what others hear isn't what she thought she was saying. She would often bring other kids to me on the playground so they could ask me the questions and I could respond (what is your name, how old are you, what school do you go to, and so on). Her problem was/is so severe that she could never tell me anything at all without being criticized and corrected which is going to happen pretty much all her life from everyone else. Home is supposed to be your haven, your protected place of love and acceptance. If that is the only place where she's getting speech then it interferes with what your primary job with her is. I am not saying give up, don't do speech with her but make sure there is a time and place. Also, remember that everything new is hard but if the therapist who works with her can reach her and make therapy meaningful they will have a wonderful relationship together. Most therapists we have seen have been creative and resourceful people that have had fun with my daughter and it's one more person in her corner. So, that's my opinion for what it's worth, best of luck to you!! !!

My Aspie son had speech therapy at age 3 to about 5. The result? Perfect articulation. At first he screamed and threw tantrums at being left (separation anxiety) but became her best student.

Of course I realize there are other issues here - just IMHO it's worth staying in speech therapy, even if you have to make some changes to accomodate her, or go somewhere else, which I realize isn't an option.

I am not a parent but a master's student completing my degree in Speech & Language therapy. I don't know the exact setting of your therapy sessions but if your child is very frustrated and not enjoying the sessions I recommend talking to the speech therapist about things that interest and are motivating to your child. In my therapy sessions I am always looking for ideas of things each child like to help increase their motivation in therapy. Therapy should have a fun atmosphere to it, for example with articulation the student and I will decide that after 10 good sounds they may take a turn at game, which I always let them pick the game. Hopefully your speech therapist is will to work with you and do what is best for your child's interests as articulation errors can persist through life if not corrected.