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

Speech Pathologists and Occupational Therapists can both play crucial roles in supporting children with picky eating and restricted diets, often working together as part of an multidisciplinary approach. 

Feeding therapy may be especially helpful for:

• Oral-Motor Skill Development: Our Speech Pathologists can assess and treat difficulties with chewing, swallowing, and coordinating oral motor skills, which may impact a child's ability to eat a variety of textures or food types.
  
• Picky Eating: Trained Speech Pathologists and Occupational Therapists can provide both direct and non-direct support to help children to feel safe and confident to explore new foods. Our feeding therapists value facilitation of empowering, non-pressure feeding sessions with a goal of building on children's intrinsic motivation to try new things. 

• Home-Based Mealtime Strategies: Our feeding therapists are passionate about providing education and strategies specific to your family and child's needs. These strategies will help you to foster a positive mealtime environment at home, so that mealtimes can be fun and enjoyable again. 

By addressing both the sensory and motor aspects of eating, as well as the emotional and behavioural challenges that may be present, our feeding therapists offer a comprehensive approach to help children overcome picky eating and expand their diets.

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

You can also fill out your details in the link below to be added to our waitlist.