{"id":9113,"date":"2015-01-15T13:41:39","date_gmt":"2015-01-15T21:41:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.speechbuddy.com\/blog\/?p=9113"},"modified":"2019-04-05T12:51:29","modified_gmt":"2019-04-05T19:51:29","slug":"4-ways-jumpstart-speech-therapy-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.speechbuddy.com\/blog\/parents-corner\/4-ways-jumpstart-speech-therapy-home\/","title":{"rendered":"4 Ways to Jumpstart Speech Therapy at Home"},"content":{"rendered":"

With the body awash in insulin to metabolize all that holiday sugar and (if you\u2019re like me) a mildly shocking reading from the scale, the New Year is a time to set new goals\u2014resolutions,<\/em> we like to say\u2014to make us especially steadfast. While most New Year\u2019s resolutions tend to involve personal disciplines like not eating so much barbecue or to get more exercise, as parents it is important to consider how our resolutions could positively influence our child\u2019s education. Here are\u00a0four\u00a0easy-to-implement resolutions to either get your child\u2019s therapy back on track or to further bolster their progress with a little speech therapy at home.<\/p>\n

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1. Re-Establish Regular Communication with your Child\u2019s SLP<\/h2>\n
\"Jumpstart<\/a>

Photo by Rasmus Lerdorf<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

Whether you\u2019re taking advantage of private services or your child is being currently seen under an Individualized Education Program<\/a> (IEP) in your local school, it is often all too easy to lose the regular contact routine with your child\u2019s SLP.\u00a0Everyone gets busy; maybe we don\u2019t want to pester our SLP; maybe my child will get annoyed with me. However, the importance of maintaining this regular communication cannot be understated. For school-based services, I advocate writing an email or calling into your SLP at least every month<\/strong><\/em> and for private practice services I recommend communicating considerably more frequently than this.\u00a0Often, parents and therapists will directly, if briefly, communicate after sessions. At every communication, I would recommend parents asked the following questions:<\/p>\n

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  1. What are the current goals and how has my child responded?<\/li>\n
  2. What\u2019s likely next on the therapy agenda?<\/li>\n
  3. What, specifically<\/em>, can I do as a parent to follow up on these goals?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    2. Get Specific Details from your SLP on how to Follow Up with your Child<\/h2>\n

    I italicized \u201cspecifically\u201d above because, as I\u2019ve mentioned in previous Speech Buddies blog posts<\/a>, you should demand instructions on exactly the following:<\/p>\n