By Pam Marshalla
Q: My student substitutes T/K and D/G. As per suggestions on your website, I am facilitating posterior tongue elevation by using a tongue depressor and having the student push against it with the posterior part of the tongue. I have been able to elicit H but not K or G. Is H the sound you refer to as a velar fricative? I need help with this method. Let me straighten this up first- H is a glottal fricative and not…
By Pam Marshalla
Q: Every week I encounter more statements by SLPs about never doing anything in therapy that has not been proven in research. These statements virtually always concern oral-motor techniques. How do you respond to this? I am so concerned about the limited thinking that has begun to dominate our profession that my heart is bleeding. I am not concerned only with OM. I am concerned about the profession at large. 🙁 Follow me here. Let’s talk about OM and then…
By Pam Marshalla
I was recently reminded of a client I worked with decades ago who taught me a very important lesson about therapy when I was a young therapist. I wanted to share his story. David David was 6;0 and non-verbal. He was a big clunky kid with fine and gross motor problems who was basically untestable, and everyone thought he had very low IQ. I was using Bliss Symbols with him (it was 1976) to develop a home-made communication board (before…
By Pam Marshalla
Sooooooooo many questions about teaching S come in that I want to take this opportunity to write out the simplest most direct method that therapists have been using since early in the 20th century. This method is reported in just about every articulation therapy textbook ever written. The oldest reference I have seen for it is Scripture (1912). Scripture’s book is one that Van Riper recommended. There are dozens of ways to do this, but this is the basic procedure––…
By Pam Marshalla
Q: My client makes many vowel errors. Can you give me some advice about teaching them? Teaching the vowels is mostly about ear training during the production of prolonged single vowels. Don’t try to teach them within the context of words. That is way too hard. Recent research (1,2) suggests that the vowels are easier to learn relative to one another instead of one-at-a-time. Therefore work on all of them and not only the few your client needs to learn….
By Pam Marshalla
Q: Is epenthesis (adding a schwa to the end of words) a concern in a child who is close to 10 years old? It affects his social interaction. If so, how would you target this? I always see epenthesis as a normal developmental process, however ten is pretty old to still be using it and, since you said it is interfering with social communication, then it is worth targeting. If I want to get rid of it I literally spell…
By Pam Marshalla
Q: My client and I speak both Spanish and English. He devoices D to make T. I don’t know how to help him. Here are the things I usually do–– Teach him about “Voice-on” and “Voice-off” in a different context. I usually start with “Ah” and “H”. Have him hold his neck at the larynx to feel the vibration of voice on the vowel and the absence of voice on H. Repeat this with the fricative cognates: S and Z,…
By Pam Marshalla
Q: I have been working with a child for a year and a half and R has been very resistant to improvement. I just stumbled upon a good R in STRI-words like “strike”, “stripe”. Yet he has problems doing what you call “lerring” [sliding back-and-forth between L and R]. Why do you think this is? R can be a grand mystery and you never know what pattern will cause it to sound right. Just go with whatever works. It could…
By Pam Marshalla
Q: I took your course on intelligibility and understand the importance of Long E in achieving the starting point for all vowels, but I cannot get my client to make a good E. It sounds flat. I would try this–– Have him say a big oral strong “Ah”. The tell him to “keep saying Ah” while he bites his back teeth together (or on a bitestick) Then tell him to “keep saying Ah” while he smiles broadly. Model this diphthong…
By Pam Marshalla
Q: My son just turned 5. He has been having difficulties with his articulation for several years especially with D, T, TH, S, Z, N and H. also he has difficulties in putting letters together such as D-O-G. He is able say things correctly only when we go really slow and draw out each sound. He also sucks in when trying to make the S sound. How can my husband and I help him with this? The severity of what…
