What Skills Do Speech Pathologists Work On?

Expressive language is how we use words, sentences, gestures and writing to communicate our thoughts, wants, and needs.

An individual with expressive language difficulties might:

• Have difficulty producing clear and structured sentences (i.e. words in the wrong order, incorrect use of words, difficult to understand)
• Have difficulty using grammatical structures of language (e.g. tenses, pronouns, plurals)
• Have difficulty naming objects
• Produce long sentences without correctly linking together the words and ideas in their sentence.
• Have trouble retelling a story.
• Have difficulty arguing their point of view.
• Have difficulty writing sentences, paragraphs and stories.

Receptive language is the ability to understand words and sentences. 

Individuals with receptive language difficulties might:

• Have difficulty following instructions that their peers may be able to follow.
• Have difficulty grouping objects and items into categories.
• Have difficulty paying attention and listening (e.g. within group activities at school)
• Repeat questions that are asked of them instead of answering them.
• Have difficulty listening to stories and being able to answer questions about what they have just heard or read.

Speech is the ability to pronounce sounds and words clearly. 

Individuals with Speech Sound Skills might:

• May be dribbling beyond normal age.
• Use only a limited number of sounds.
• Leave off sounds within words.
• Speech is less clear than most of their peers.
• Have difficulty being understood by strangers.
• Experience frustration from not being understood by others. 
• Develop reading and writing difficulties

Literacy difficulties refers to trouble making progress at school in the areas of reading, writing, sounding out, spelling, and reading comprehension. 

Children with difficulty learning to read may show difficulties with:

• Identifying letters and recognise the sounds they make.
• Recognising a range of 'sight words' that cannot be sounded out.
• Blending sounds together to make a word.
• Breaking up a word into individual sounds.
• Breaking up a sentence into individual words.
• Understanding the meaning of individual words.
• Remembering a string of words and understand their meaning as part of a sentence.
• Linking a series of sentences to make a text.

Stuttering is a disruption in the flow of speech. This can be when words, sounds or phrases are repeated or prolonged (stretched out). Sometimes the flow of speech stops altogether (called blocking).

Individuals who stutter may show the following difficulties:

• Difficulty starting a word, phrase or sentence
• Prolonging a word or sounds within a word
• Repetition of a sound, syllable or word
• Brief silence for certain syllables or words, or pauses within a word (broken word)
• Addition of extra words such as "um" if difficulty moving to the next word is anticipated
• Excess tension, tightness, or movement of the face or upper body to produce a word
• Anxiety about talking
• Limited ability to effectively communicate

Making an appointment is easy. Contact us by phoning (02) 8625 5998 to arrange an assessment of your child's communication and speech skills.