Does My Child Have a Communication Disorder?

1. Does My Child Have a Speech Sound Disorder?
2. Can My Child's Speech Impact Reading and Spelling?
3. Does my child have a fluency disorder?
4. Does my child have a voice disorder?

Does My Child Have a Speech Sound Disorder?

Speech is a motor skill.  Just as a child's ability to run, draw, and dance 
to improve as he or she continues to develop, so does speech.  Still, you 
can't help but look at and listen to other same-aged children and wonder if 
your child somehow "fell behind."  Sometimes it's a comment from another 
parent or a teacher's observation that makes you more aware of your child's 
speech that you are so used to hearing that you can't even judge objectively.
Speech therapists often use normative data to determine whether or not a 
child is developing within normal expectations.  I have attached a copy of 
the Iowa Nebrask Norms    under the section_____________  Once you've looked 
at the norms you may now ask yourself  "Does my child "have" the sound?" 

A speech sound disorder is divided into articulation (motor componant 
characterized by distortions, substitutions, ommissions,and deletions) and 
phonological (language based).  Most children I have seen in the East 
Brunswick Public Schools tend to have articulation disorders with distortions 
(a sound is "not quite right") or substitutions (a "rabbit" becomes 
a "wabbit.")  The ability to understand a person is what enables a child to 
be diagnosed with a speech sound disorder. Many children and adults distort 
sounds and lead successful and happy lives. The important thing is that 
everyone can understand what they are saying. If you ask a semi-familiar 
listener if they noticed something wrong with your child's speech and they 
say they are unsure and need to listen carefully next time, I would not be 
overly concerned.  Someone with a speech sound disorder does not need someone 
to listen very closely to detect an error, it will prevent him or her from 
being understood

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Can My Child's Speech Impact Reading and Spelling?

Yes and No.  If a child is unable to auditorally tell the difference between 
sounds, their reading and spelling will most likely be affected.  If a child 
substitutes one sound for another (example "w" for "r") and cannot tell the 
difference, academics may be affected. Speech impacted spelling would be 
evident in words written as "wed", "wead", and "wun."  Ommissions would 
similarly be reflected in writing.  Speech sound distortions and words able 
to be auditorally discriminated do not impact academics. A weak /r/ or 
dentalized /s/ are not able to be motorically produced, but are heard 
correctly by the child.

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Does my child have a fluency disorder?

If your child is having trouble with their Spanish, French, or Latin class 
you're definitely on the wrong website. Being fluent in a second, third or 
tenth language helps us to understand what fluency is.  A completely "fluent" 
person speaks without any interuptions in his or her speech. NO ONE is always 
fluent. I repeat it is normal to be disfluent at times.  That means it's okay 
to pause between or in between sentences, use fillers (um..., you know, like, 
yea)  It's okay to occassionally forget words and make those Freuding slips.  
Some disfulency is normal.
LINGUISTIC DISFLUENCY sounds like many of the examples I just gave you, 
except they occur much more frequently.  If English is a second language 
linguistic disfulencies are expected as a person thinks harder to find the 
right word and structure.  This is not a disorder.  If a child pauses 
frequently, uses generic words like "thing", and "there", and takes a longer 
time to respond, the disfluencies may show that a there is an underlying 
language based disorder which should be examined.  If a disorder is present 
it would be treated as a language and/or cognititive disorder.
STUTTERING AND CLUTTERING are true fluency disorders.  Speech may be 
difficult to understand because of hesitations, repetitions, blocks and 
prolongations of sounds or words. With the exeption of blocks, children tend 
to speech disfluently as they are learning a language-even if it is their 
first one.  When young children run to share an exciting story they tend to 
speech very fast and the repetition of the first sound of word may be heard. 
This is to be expected.  As children mature, the number of disfluencies 
decrease and prolongations and repititions are no longer expected. A child 
does not "grow out" of stuttering or have it "come and go."  With speech 
therapy and practice one can learn to manange and control the flow of 
speech.  
Please contact the speech therapist about any child who shows physical 
frustration at not being able to "get a word out" such as grimacing, tapping, 
or fisting.
 You remember when what's her name got that new thing?

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Does my child have a voice disorder?

A child with a voice disorder may have a voice that sounds hoarse, strained, 
gurgly, nasal, too loud or too low.  There are many things that may affect 
the quality of persons voice such as allergies, hearing impairment, nodules, 
polyps, shyness, inadequate lung support, everyday behaviors and variations 
in bone structure.  Until the cause is known, or other causes can be ruled 
out, an appropriate treatment plan can be made.  It is required that an 
evaluation by an ENT (Ears, Nose, Throat doctor) or an Ottolaryngologist be 
performed prior to a referral.

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