Eliciting Sound- /k/

This first thing I want to do today is to express my sincere sympathy to those who have lost so much in these recent weeks due to this bizarre weather pattern we have been having. The devastation has been overwhelming for many. I pray God lifts their spirits and sends angels to help them recover. I think it would be appropriate at this time to remind you to support the Red Cross. They are there at every crisis offering help for those in need. So if you can’t go and physically help your fellow man, you can make a donation.

Now, for today’s tips and tricks on getting the /k/ sound.

I have often felt baffled by why kids cannot produce /k/ when developmentally we make posterior sounds before anterior. Think about it, a baby’s first sounds are goo-goo and ga-ga, so isn’t /k/ just a naturally developing response? It makes me go, hmmm. Luckily there are several ways to go about teaching this sound. These tips are not in any particular order, so don’t think Tip #1 is the best. All these tips have been used successfully by us and as you know what works with one child does not always work with another. We are simply sharing some ideas of things to try.

TIP #1 Cue with “Clear out the Popcorn”
I have found that the major reason a child cannot to imitate a sound from our model and demonstration is simply that they don’t understand what we are telling them to do. They just don’t “get it.” It also seems that they more often than not just don’t get it when we try to show and explain how to do those sounds that are made in the back of our mouths: /k/, /g/, /r/. So to help them “get it” I try to relate the sound to something to which they are familiar. Most all of us have eaten popcorn and don’t we all, at times, get a husk caught on the back of our tongue and have to clear it out? That is what I use to help them understand what I mean by back of the mouth or back of the tongue, etc. Every child I have had in therapy can show me with 100% accuracy where the front and back of the mouth is on a drawing and can point to the front and back of their own mouths, but yet cannot put their own tongues there. So to teach them how to find and lift the back of their tongues, we practice that horrible hacky-growly guttural sound we make when clearing out the popcorn. We do this until I feel they fully understand what I mean when I say use the back of your tongue. Once they “get it” you can shape it into a beautiful /k/ in isolation and begin your regular therapy. If they forget to get their tongue up when drilling syllables or words, just cue with “clear out the popcorn.”
If you really want to be the fun “speech teacher” why not bring some popcorn to eat in therapy? Just check for food allergies first ;)


TIP#2 Cereal
You can get correct tongue positioning for /k/ using cereal-Cheerios or Fruit Loops. This approach is taught by Sara Rosenfeld-Johnson in her Talk Tools program. Basically what you do is place the cereal behind the bottom front teeth and have the child place the tip of his tongue in the cereal hole and hold it there to keep the tip down while making the /k/ using the back of the tongue. This technique is explained in detail in the Talk Tools program. Here is the link to the website. http://www.talktools.com/ I highly recommend you learn how to implement this technique because it is effective. It is great for kids who front the back sounds and need the tactile cuing.

TIP #3 Tactile Cues—Holding the Tip and Blade
For years I have had kids to use their own finger to hold the tongue tip down to get the correct position for /k/ when they were substituting /t/ for/k/. Many times they will have to not just hold the tip but the tongue blade as well. You can start out with them holding only the tip down while they say /k/, but if they start making the /k/ with the blade of their tongue mid palate you will have to have them hold more of the tongue down and push the tongue further back in their mouths. This has been exceptionally effective at achieving a good /k/ sound. Many people do not like this approach, but if it works then I say use it. I have had some kids who have had to use their finger to hold their tongue down not only in isolation but through syllable and even a few into words (gasp)! However, never fear, I have never had a kid graduate from speech therapy and still have their finger in their mouth!! I never ask them to quit using their finger. They eventually get tired of using it and stop on their own. Don’t you think we sometimes worry too much over the little things?
When implementing this strategy if you are the one holding the child’s tongue via your own gloved hand, finger cot, or tongue depressor be careful of a hyper gag reflex. If you find a child with a hyper gag, you have two choices: 1) desensitize the gag reflex or 2) don’t use this approach. If the child can tolerate you inside his mouth a nice little tip is to use flavored toothpaste on a dental swab. It is just less invasive tasting.

TIP# 4 Use Gravity
Some children need a little more help learning to elevate the back of their tongue, and gravity helps! There are suggestions to have the children let their head lean over the back of their chair or have them lie in the floor. Personally, I have had no success with using the chair technique. I have had success doing therapy while the child is lying on his/her back in the floor. Initially, I just have the child lie on his back in the floor and do some deep breathing exercises to help him relax. I will sometimes lay a book on his stomach for this. They can see the book rise and fall as they breathe. After the child looks relaxed and at ease with lying on the floor, I begin therapy using the other techniques explained in this article. The one that seems to work the best is using tactile cues. I will start with a tongue blade and gently “push” the tongue tip down toward the back of the mouth. If this doesn’t work, I try having the child “cough” really hard, (similar to the clearing out the throat.) Usually, this combination of techniques works within one to two sessions, and we can go back to sitting in our chairs for therapy.

TIP#5 Getting Tongue Retraction
You cannot produce a /k/ without your tongue retracting back into the mouth. To achieve a tongue retraction response, stimulate midline of the tongue from anterior to posterior with a tongue depressor or your gloved finger. Pam Marshalla explains this very well on her website Q & A section: http://www.pammarshalla.com/qaeach/07_08.html


I suppose this sums up every tip and trick we have up our sleeves. Hopefully this has affirmed that what you’re doing is right or maybe even got you to thinking it is ok to try something off the wall in therapy!
Remember kids learn more when having FUN than any other time, so have some fun in therapy this week!

Leah and Dean
www.2galsspeechproducts.com

Adventure Pack Software

Good Monday Morning! I hope each of you have had a wonderful Easter. I went to DC to visit my son and daughter-in-love and had a fantastic time. It's always great to spend time with family and DC is such an amazing and fun city to visit.

Today's blog post is out of sync from our eliciting sounds series, but one I think you'll enjoy. I don't often take time to boast about our fabulous materials but I want to tell you about our Adventure Pack Software. We developed this with the aid of my son when he was a senior in college. This was our first product as 2 Gals Speech Products, LLC and our first attempt to create software.

The intent of these games is simply to habituate the sound once it has been established in words. It does not teach the sound. As you know, drill and practice can be very boring so this is our attempt to make practice fun! Our kids love it and beg to play it. This is a great product for pro-active parents, so please feel free to tell them where it can be purchased.

It does not record their responses nor does it have voice recognition so it is up to the therapist to keep data and make judgments on correctness of responses. Quite frankly, we couldn’t afford to produce a product with those features. Most SLPs have “super ears” and can detect errors while multitasking so that wasn’t viewed as a problem to us.

We use the Adventure Pack in many ways:

• For drill and practice with the SLP along side the child, keeping data and making corrections as needed.
  
• For practice alone while the SLP is working 1:1 with another student.
• For practice alone while the SLP does other job related tasks (paperwork). I still verbally correct from my desk as needed ;)
• As a reward, when they reach a particular goal or when you have an extra 5 minutes left in therapy.

As you can see there are many ways it can be utilized in your therapy. Two major benefits that we had not expected but were thrilled to see:

1. The kids wanted to move along in their carryover. They would ask, “Can I practice phrases now? Can I go on to sentences?”
2. With their focus on the game and not their speech production it virtually eliminated that over exaggeration of the correct sound in words so that their production quickly became fluent and natural!

I hope you will take a few minutes and explore it further by watching this powerpoint presentation: http://www.slideshare.net/2gals/adventure-pack-presentation

Enjoy!
Leah and Dean
www.2galsspeechproducts.com