Speech Issues for

[Guest guest]

Kristy -

Speech has been 's largest delay and the reason she is so far behind

in school - School is a very verbal atmosphere. How do you know if a

Kindergartner knows his/her ABCs? You ask them to sing it! How do you know

which number is on the card - you ask them to say it? How do you know if

he/she knows the sight words you ask them to say it! If your child does not

speak - they are left behind. had 10 words in Kindergarten/ 20 words

in 1st grade and then exploded with words in 2nd grade - but by then she was

already 2 years behind. Her speech is not clear yet but her peers

understand her better than Adults. Adults who are with her constantly can

understand about 70% of what she is saying unless she is upset and then we

are left in the cold. She had a speech device but it was faster and easier

for her to use words - we are now working on conversations with her ST. She

has a few issues with sounds but they are the " TH " sound which comes out " B "

so " the " sounds like " ba " ; " they " like " bay " . But even with this issue she

mastered 37 of the 40 Kindergarten sight words by the end of 2nd grade - and

now she has 20 of the 30 first grade sight words. She will have the rest by

Christmas and then we will work on 2nd grade and I am hoping that by 4th

grade we will be grade level.

I held her back in the IU because speech wasn't there but that was a mistake

on my part - she needed to be in Kindergarten with children who speak as

opposed to the IU where the kids don't. And more than that in the IU they

did not learn ABC's and Numbers 1-20 - which are learned in Kindergarten.

If I could do it again I would have her do 2 years of Kindergarten as

opposed to 3 years of the IU.

Speech is SOOOO Important for school - you just get left behind when you

don't talk. You make friends, especially with the class talker who LOVES

you because you never interrupt her/him. Also the boys like you because you

don't talk as much as the other girls, you just play.

We would participate in any study needed.

Darlene and (9)