Re: Re: Special pre-school/childcare for toddler w/ apraxia or not?

[Guest guest]

Thanks everyone for sharing your experiences. It's helpful to hear.

For those who did special needs pre-K, did you confirm that the therapists

there had training in/experience with verbal apraxia before you started? Not

sure how it will be when we're in the 3-5 grouping, but our experience with

early intervention (birth to 3) has been very challenging in terms of

finding therapists who have actual apraxia experience (or even having the

programs be willing to tell you what kind of experience they have). It seems

to be a " you need to take what you can get mentality " .

This is frustrating since we already did 5 mos of speech therapy with

therapists who don't know apraxia and my son made NO progress whatsoever

during that time and now I know it was a waste of time all around. I sure

don't want to enroll my son in a special needs pre-school in the future and

repeat that situation.

Or would the benefit be that since the other special needs pre-k kids have

delays also, your child won't feel so far behind (but you need to still do

private speech therapy with an apraxia trained SLP on your own from a

therapy standpoint in order to make progress).

Sorry for all the questions. If we want to go the standard pre-school route,

we need to start identifying them and applying now for next year - so I'm

trying to figure out if regular pre-school or special needs would be the way

to go...

-

On Thu, Sep 23, 2010 at 12:16 PM, mosense <mosense@...> wrote:

>

>

> My 9yo daughter went to a special needs prek and was bused there five days

> a week full time. She was in a self-contained class with only other special

> needs kids. But there were also Integrated classrooms wiht typical kids

> whose parents drove them there and most did half day. That may be something

> you could look for, so he could still get his services, if he qualifies, and

> still be in a regular prek for prek programs. They also had full-day

> programs for typical kids who needed it as a daycare too. There were very

> few kids with physical limitations, most were autistic, down syndrome or had

> CP and speech delays like mine.

>

>

>

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[Guest guest]

Hi,

 

Have you looked into having your threapist refer to the Vellerman book

'Childhood Apraxia of Speech Resource Guide'.  Dr. Vellerman wrote this book

with the intent of it being a highly useful tool to help SLP's who were not

well trained or experienced with dealing in Apraxia.  The book is very easy

to follow, especially for trained SLP's, and should help provide your SLP with

a great outline and guide towards improving the quality of your speech threapy

time.  

 

Here is the description of the book :

 

" This comprehensive resource guide was created in response to the requests from

practicing speech language pathologists and parents of children with apraxia of

speech for information on the nature of this complicated disorder and advice on

assessment and treatment methods. Fundamental aspects of the disorder are

discussed in depth and different viewpoints regarding apraxia are compared,

eliminating the need to track down multiple sources. Detailed practical

assessment and treatment guidelines provide speech language pathologists with a

framework of how to help children with apraxia and the motivation behind each

treatment. Case studies bring material into a real world context.  "

 

Good luck.  Even without this book I personally would make sure I was working

with a SLP whom, if they were not qualified to deal with Apraxia, was willing

to learn how to treat Apraxia more proficiently through training and

research.  Don't be afraid to ask your SLP for this type of commitmet !

 

- Josh Z (Brady 2.5 CAS, Madelyn 4 - chatterbox)

>

>

> My 9yo daughter went to a special needs prek and was bused there five days

> a week full time. She was in a self-contained class with only other special

> needs kids. But there were also Integrated classrooms wiht typical kids

> whose parents drove them there and most did half day. That may be something

> you could look for, so he could still get his services, if he qualifies, and

> still be in a regular prek for prek programs. They also had full-day

> programs for typical kids who needed it as a daycare too. There were very

> few kids with physical limitations, most were autistic, down syndrome or had

> CP and speech delays like mine.

>

>

>

--

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M I C H E L L E W A L DO I N T E R I O R S

stylish + inviting contemporary spaces

w. http://www.michellewaldointeriors.com

e. michelle@...

p. 215-500-9070

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[Guest guest]

Thanks everyone for weighing in. It's good to hear your perspective and

advice.

Given how difficult it's been to find SLPs trained in apraxia here, I'm

beginning to think it's pretty unlikely that we'd get access to an

apraxia-specializing therapist through a special needs pre-school in our

area. We're in Philadelphia county and I've been very unimpressed by most

things here so far. My guess is that we'd need to continue to get therapy

through our private SLP and just try to find a pre-school where hopefully

Ethan isn't frustrated by his lack of communication skills compared to the

other kids.

I'm definitely going to check in with our SLP to see what her opinion is

after working with Ethan for a while and seeing how he progresses. Hopefully

that will give me more insights since I'm still uncertain about this

matter...

Thanks everyone,

On Fri, Sep 24, 2010 at 8:30 AM, mosense <mosense@...> wrote:

>

>

> We came out of EI with speech 2x a week. She had no diagnosis, it was just

> severe speech delay going into special needs prek, but they did increase her

> speech to 3x a week. She was 3yo when she started. The next summer when she

> turned 4yo, we saw her Ped Neurologist who gave her a dx of Apraxia and

> wrote a letter to the district and prek to give her an Augmentive

> Communication Evaluation. They did that right away and bought her a simple

> device. The SLP at her prek went out and took a course in Apraxia within a

> month. She was very excited with her new knowledge. But no, when she got

> there, they had no knowledge of Apraxia, I dont know if it was ever

> mentioned during EI either. I'd also been told that Apraxia can't be truly

> diagnosed until after the age of 3-4yo. All you can do is ask at the schools

> you're looking at how much experience they have with Apraxia.

> Maureen

>

>

>

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M I C H E L L E W A L DO I N T E R I O R S

stylish + inviting contemporary spaces

w. http://www.michellewaldointeriors.com

e. michelle@...

p. 215-500-9070

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