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Tuesday, June 21, 2016

Laundry Room Speech Therapy

Dirty laundry is the story of my life.  Laundry baskets don't stay empty very long around here.  Seems like I wash a load, turn around, and the basket is full again.  I spend a lot of time sorting, washing, transferring, folding, and putting away laundry.  I'm not complaining though.  Really, it's an easy job when compared to other household chores.  It's one I haven't delegated to anyone else.  Scrubbing the tub...Amber?  Are you busy?  Sweeping the garage...Sam?  Grab the broom.  I'll stick with the laundry.

It probably comes as no surprise then when I say I spend a lot of time in the laundry room.  I teach Pre-School skills, give spelling tests, and even conduct speech therapy while completing the task of laundry.

We haven't ventured down the path of organized speech therapy with Joseph yet.  I know it's the norm for children with Down syndrome, but I rarely subscribe to the norms.  I'm wishy washy about the usefulness of it.  I'd have to pack up younger siblings, drive a distance, take time away from our normal homeschool day, leave older siblings to fend for themselves.  Would the results payoff?  I don't know.  Ask me about this in September and I'll probably think differently.

However, I do strive to incorporate my own version of speech therapy into our daily schedule.  The best place for practice is in the laundry room, of course.

Here's what I do:

As I remove items from the dryer, I have Joseph label them (with words).  He'll say something like shirt, an easy word for him.  I'll add to that and have him repeat it.  I might say t-shirt or long-sleeve shirt or sweatshirt.  These are harder for him to say.  He's not fond of multi-syllable words.  Taking another item from the dryer, he'll label it pants.  I'll say blue jeans or work pants or athletic pants.  He has a hard time with the consonant+l blend and also the /th/ phoneme so I like to incorporate those as much as possible.

I know speech therapists have special training to help with these issues and all I'm armed with is the internet, unconditional love and a burning desire for him to succeed, but so far it's working for us....until I change my mind.  Like I said, I'm wishy washy on this subject.


Linking up with Works For Me Wednesday

6 comments:

  1. We are in the early stages of choosing the next steps for our almost-two year old with Down Syndrome. The hospital neurodevelopment therapist who has been working with Michael since birth will finish up when he's two. Then any assistance (free here in New Zealand) we get for him comes from the Education Department. However they will only visit every six months (his current therapist comes every month). I could take him to an outfit that does a two hour intensive appointment every week which covers music therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy and physio. Sounds fabulous but isn't a good fit for our homeschooling family. It costs an arm and a leg, what if he doesn't want to cooperate during a session and, like you, I'd have to load up a few other kids and leave my bigger ones at home. Just now we are going with the decision to have the six month Early Ed teacher and I will fill in the gaps, armed with the internet, books, love and the strong will for Michael to progress happily. That's enough for now.
    Thanks for posting about Joseph's progress and how you manage it. It is inspiring and encouraging for me as we follow the path you have already walked with a life philosophy I can relate to.

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    1. The decisions weighing on our minds are endless, aren't they? Might I suggest music as a home therapy. Joseph LOVES Toddler Tunes and Signing Time. Yes, it is TV time, but he's always actively dancing around, signing, singing. I think it's great for his speech development. I wish you the best with Michael's progress.

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  2. I try to help my 3 year old with the sounds she has a hard time with, but she usually gets irritated with me and says, "Stop saying that, mommy" when I repeat a word the right way to say it. :/ Keep on trucking, right? Good luck!

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    1. Oh, please don't think Joseph is always receptive to this laundry room speech therapy I speak of. He isn't. I've found twice to be the magic number of times to have him repeat a word before getting irritated with me. Keep on trucking! or a little reference to the new Dory movie...Just keep swimming! Have a great summer day.

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  3. We have nine children, including a 6 year daughter with Prader Willi Syndrome that is developmentally behind (3-4 years of age?) and struggles with articulation. I work with her here and there at pronouncing certain words "better", even if not totally correctly yet. Every bit helps, if you try to be consistent. I have a program I am hoping to implement more consistently with her this year that I would highly recommend. I used it with my son that had just a few articulation errors, where my daughter has MANY. It is called Superstar Speech by Deborah Lott (expanded edition, I believe), and is available on Amazon...you can also read my review on it on that site. There are tools to gauge what sounds your child needs work on, whether they should have mastery of them at their current age or not, cards to cut and use, lots of games to play, tips to help with all of the different sounds, etc. Deborah Lott is a licensed speech pathologist who also home schools, and the illustrations in the book were drawn by her daughter. Any questions, feel free to contact me at elireeves@stny.rr.com or message through Facebook (Rebecca Johnson Reeves).

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    1. Wow! Thank you for the heads up about Super Star Speech. I subscribed to her newsletter and just received an awesome email called "Teaching the /l/ Sound". I did a quick review and it's definitely something I would use in my home.

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