Speech Success!!
breezy0629
member
June 28 I wrote a list of all my concerns and things I knew DS needed to work on for the IEP. Our SLP told me last week that it is time to reassess his speech goals. When she says that, I know it is my job to be on top of whatI know, so we can work together in our expertise.
So, I pulled out my handy-dandy list.
It has only been 4 months since I made that list.
Right there in black & white I can see his progress.
? Done
? Mastered
? Emerging
? Will respond to choice questions without any echolalia.
still having a hard time with the choice, but not echoing our questions!!
? Will request "more" without prompting consistently
? Will use pronouns I, me, my, you, your correctly in conversation
very much improved, still not 100%
? Will protest words other than"no", such as "I don't know" or "stop it"
? Answers/Understands Wh Questions (who,what,where)
? Make Observations in environment
much improved, especially with sister
? Respond to greetings appropriately
much less delayed, more appropriate
? Express/Respond to Thankyou
? Asks for help from others appropriately/offer help?.
The list is much longer, and there are still plenty of things that need work. But just LOOK at those improvements!
It seems like it was just yesterday that we were talking about sentence length (2 words, 3 words, 4 words on average) and now he is talking in infinite sentence lengths. Now to make it more appropriate....
Re: Speech Success!!
Slow and steady wins the race
At 28 months, DS had been in Speech for all of 4 months. At that time, we were working on 2 word rote carrier phrases, imaginary play, beginning the process of prompting him to ask for help... etc...
As you can see, 'asking for help' is now crossed off (16 months later) - but what you can't see is that we are adding a new level. NOW that we've taught him how to ask for help and he has generalized it... he also OVERgeneralized it and we have to back up and get him to use clarification words to do more than just say 'help' over and over. It's all a process.
DS is now 3 yrs 4 months old.
Auntie:
SLP has a full list (it had to have been 25 items or so) of things that he needs to be working on. She had about 7 or 8 that we worked on together and then I worked out the rest before the IEP. I haven't been diligent to get her involved in that whole list before now - but there's never a better time than NOW. We can only do so much in that 45 minutes. Plus there are things SHE is more helpful with and things that (as you stated) are really things that have to be worked on in a peer setting.
I made notes on the existing list so that she could see what he was working towards and what I think about that progress. I always make a big deal about the difference between a successful attempt with Her/Us/Sis verses his peers at school. If he's not doing it with his peers - we DON'T mark it off! Why is it so hard to convince some therapists that NO, he doesn't do that with his peers!!! It seems that every corner I turn, someone is telling me that 3 year olds just don't do that. When it is CLEAR that he is working so very hard for every attempt at spontaneous unprompted 'conversation'.
So, this is where I get stuck re: language delay. If we really zoomed past a lot of the sentence length issues and got him 'talking' pretty fast, are these traits of ALL the ASD's language glitches or is this 'language delay' that disqualifies him from an Aspergers Dx down the line??? He always talked.... we just had to PULL the purpose of what he was talking about out of him. Maybe a poor way to ask that question... but do you get what I'm saying?
That helps me a lot. I don't really know why it even matters, but it seems that I have to be on my A game to get DS what he needs. So, if I feel like I don't really understand something (like what is the difference in language issues associated w/Aspergers or what is a language delay that is more specific to Autism/PDDNOS) then the conversations are harder re: advocacy.
DS is so tricky. No - we didn't have to baby proof. No - he wasn't curious... and I guess I would say still isn't. But, he is very good at picking up on what other kids are doing and copying. Is this a skill we taught him... yes, I think it is. Does he seem warm in his attempts to engage, yes. Does he do it appropriately? Not so much. He's not the kid in class with a smug look and no interaction - he's very much the kid who doesn't know HOW but clearly wants to join in. And, so he does join in - but he's too close, or too aggressive, or doesn't know when the game is over.... but never initiates. It's like he doesn't know that he can actually change it up.
At 3, I guess it's totally ok to fall into multiple categories as long as we're addressing the needs.