Maddie is becoming more aware of her sounds and the targets we are working on. She is even attempting to self correct and putting emphasis on sounds she knows to be in error. Today we discovered Maddie’s accuracy is much higher on /f/ in the final and medial position. We practiced /f/ in both of those positions of words in the mirror for accuracy and the feeling of coarticulation of the /f/ sound. She should continue to practice medial and final /f/ at home due to higher success and accuracy. In addition, we worked on the /s/ sound in the initial position of words.
Today Maddie and I continued articulation of /f/ in isolation and /f/ + a vowel to continue coarticulation practice. She continues to accurately produce /f/ in isolation given many cues to bite her lip or look at herself in the mirror. Initial /f/ plus any additional sound still creates difficulty for Maddie as she attempts to insert the /g/ sound in between. I also probed for stimulability of /s/ in isolation. Maddie is able to produce /s/ at this level and should continue to strengthen this awareness before continuing to /s/ at the word level or /s/ blends.
Madison did a great job today. She demonstrates a little difficulty transitioning to speech because she doesn’t want to miss out on what her classmates may be doing. Once in the room Maddie is ready to play and practice. Given visual and verbal cues, Maddie was able to produce /f/ in isolation with 75% accuracy. We continued with the /fi/ /fa/ /fo/ syllables. Maddie does better with /fa/ and /fo/ because the transition to the open mouth syllable in the coarticulation is more drastic than the lips redacting for /fi/. This continues to only be successful when Maddie has the visual feedback of the mirror. We also worked on using he and she pronouns correctly in conversation/structured play.
Maddie was eager to attend speech today. We began with auditory bombardment of initial /f/ words. We continued by reviewing why we come to speech. We used the mirror to elicit /f/ in isolation. Maddie does well with this. She continues to be able to produce /f/ in the initial position of /f/ + a vowel with 60% accuracy using the mirror. I sent home the activity that we completed and Maddie should continue at this level. Her accuracy decreasing significantly when we attempt /f/ in the initial position or words. The coarticulation of the various sound still continues to create difficulty for Maddie therefore she should continue accurate productions at home of just /f/ + a vowel.
We also worked on pronouns and she currently uses “he” in place of she when talking about or describing manipulatives. We finished with a flashlight task where Maddie enjoyed turning off the lights and searching around the room for our f manipulatives.
Maddie did a great job today. We had speech outside and we were able to minimize distraction. In isolation, with a mirror she was able to produce /f/ very well! She stated she had been practicing with Dad at home. When we attempted /f/ in the initial position she was only 40% accurate. We reverted back to /f/ followed by a vowel in order to increase coarticulation. I will collect baseline data for medial and final /f/ next week.
Maddie and I had our initial session today. I collected baseline data to establish speech goals. Maddie is a happy social girl who engages easily and was eager to head to speech. We completed a community helpers activity. Maddie has a great vocabulary and familiar listeners can use context to fill in the words she is attempting that are unintelligible. Maddie demonstrates some phonological processes such as backing. She uses /g/ for /f/ (ex GireGighter for Firefighter). Interestingly, Maddie is also fronting. She uses the alveolar sounds of /d/ for /sh/ (ex do for shoe). Maddie would benefit from use of a mirror for visual feedback. Our initial goal will be /f/ in the initial position with 80% accuracy.
