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8 ways to use picture books to help develop early language skills

How to read picture books for early language development mum and toddler reading

Some of the best memories I have as a child is the fun sleep overs at my grandparents’ place. Nanna would spoil us with a yummy dinner followed by ice cream sandwiches, literally ice cream squished between two wafer biscuits. Never will I forget the packets of lollies, (typically the natural confectionary snakes) she would hand us at the end of our sleep over. I can also remember the times that she would read us a bedtime story and my Pa would act out some of the characters’ voices and make me giggle in delight to no end. These are cherished memories that I won’t forget and now looking back, I realise how lucky I was to have been exposed to such a rich experience using books, stories and language. And now as an aunty, I try to read to my niece as often as I can as I love reading story books with her and enjoy that special time together.

For those of you who have kids, grandkids or nieces and nephews of your own, I’m sure you’ve heard it said many times that you should read to your kids from a very young age as it helps with their learning and development. As a Speech Pathologist, I give this advice to parents often so that they can help develop their children’s early language skills. However, the common responses I usually receive from parents is that they say things like “he/she gets bored”, “they can’t sit still and listen to the whole book” or “he/she won’t answer questions when I ask them about it”. Does this sound like your children? Or some parents are worried that they’re just not sure HOW to read to their children and make it fun, interesting and to help them with their language development. Fear not! You’re not the only one! Sometimes for little children, sitting through a whole book and listening to the story is just too hard, and reading to children can be quite an “art form” in some cases. But don’t worry, there are plenty of ways to use picture books to help your child understand and learn language, without having to read it cover to cover while also making it enjoyable and not feel like a chore.

Dr Seuss reading quote

Benefits of using pictures books to develop early language skills

Reading picture books to young children has multiple benefits for both you and your child.

  1. You have quality time that you get to enjoy with each other.
  2. Reading can help develop children’s love for books and will help to increase their imagination skills.
  3. Story books can often be a springboard into helping children learn their letters, sounds and some basic written words.
  4. For younger children, picture books are a great tool to help children develop early language skills, particularly for children who are ‘late talkers’, but also kids with typically developing or advanced language skills.
  5. By modelling language for children to hear whilst showing them the items in a book, it allows them to more easily link meanings to words.

Although most picture books that are targeted at the younger ages are quite short stories already, you don’t have to read a story from beginning to end if your child isn’t up to sitting through a whole book. Picture books can be used to target multiple areas of language with even just a few pages, and you can work on a variety of goals depending on your child’s needs. So below are 8 different ways that picture books can be used to help develop your child’s early language skills.

1. Build up vocabulary (nouns)

Children need to learn words to be able to label things around them and refer to them by the words we all know. Using pictures is a great way to do this as we don’t always have every type of object around the house to teach kids using the real item, so this is where pictures are great. In the book, point to items/objects on the page and label them for your child to hear. Tell them the names of the animals and also talk about the different sounds they make. For example, say “Look, can you see the cow? There’s the cow. Cow. The cow says moo”. See if your child can say the word “cow” and if they can’t, get them to imitate the sound it makes (moo). This is great to do with children who are late talkers or those who are just learning to talk. Showing items and labelling the picture with spoken words can help children connect the picture/object with the word. If you are modelling new words, make sure you REPEAT REPEAT REPEAT. Say the word multiple times for children to hear. Repetition is key to learning these new words.

2. Learn action words (verbs)

Who has heard the rule “every sentence has to have a verb” when growing up? I’m sure most of you would be familiar with this. And it is true! Every complete sentence has to include a verb (action word) for it to be considered a sentence. However, verbs are the types of words that a lot of parents don’t always think to model to their kids. It’s easy to tell them the words of things (nouns), but the verbs are often neglected. And to help children move on from saying single words to using 2 – 3 word phrases, they need to become familiar with using verbs in their vocabulary too.

Use your picture books to teach your child verbs. The characters in the story are always doing something, so label the actions for your child to hear and if possible, model the actual action too. For example, you could point to the picture and say “baby is clapping, clap, clap, clap” and then model the action for your child to see and for them to copy. This will help your child to learn early sentence structure like noun + verb such as “mummy eat”, “daddy kick”, “boy is swimming”. Drawing attention to lots of action words will help your little ones increase their use of phrases and sentences.

3. Learn describing words (adjectives)

Children’s picture books are often very visual and colourful with lots of details in the illustrations. You can use these pictures to label and model the things/items and use lots of describing words. Describing words can include things like colour, size, shape etc. For example, when pointing to a picture of a cat you can say “Cat! He has black fur, he is so fluffy. Look at his pointy ears and long tail”. Children learn language through listening to others, so the more you model your language with lots of describing words the easier it will be for your child to use describing words in their own language and also increase the length of their sentences beyond just single words.

In this video, Speech Pathologist Monique Speakman goes through some examples of how to use picture books to help with early language development. Click here to buy your own copy of the Where is the Green Sheep book.

4. Expand object knowledge

This means we can use picture books to talk about the function of an object – how is it used or what is it used for? We can name the objects on the page and talk about them, for example, “soap – that’s for getting nice and clean”, “gloves – they keep our hands warm when it’s cold outside”, “clock – that tells us the time”. Being able to identify objects and understand what they are used for makes it easier for children to understand what the items/objects are and why they need them.

5. Understanding and answering questions

Picture books are great for developing children’s understanding and answering of questions. Ask questions relating to the objects or characters within the book. We can vary the questions (who, what, where, when, why and how). For younger children aged between 1 – 2 years, ask more simple questions like “what is that?” or “where is the sheep”? As children get older (3 – 5 years of age) they begin to understand more complex questions like “why is he running away?”, “how do you know the duck is feeling sad?”. This will help to expand your child’s knowledge of positions/locations using where questions, or cause and effect using why and how questions. Picture books are a great way to practise answering different questions.

6. Learn correct use of pronouns (he/she his/hers, they)

If this is your goal, pick a book that has a couple of characters (both boys and girls). Again, point to the picture and model the correct pronoun. For example, “she is a girl, she is brushing her hair”. “He is a boy, that is his room”. Remember to REPEAT REPEAT and REPEAT the words so children have the opportunity to hear it and learn it for themselves.

Children are made readers, in the laps of their parents

7. Fill in the blank technique

How often do your kids ask you to read the same story over and over again? Kids often have their favourites and although you may be getting sick of reading it every night, it’s wonderful when children want to hear the same story as you know that they will be engaged and will listen to you. But what it also means is that each time you read it again and again, they learn something new that they may not have picked up on the previous times. So they are continuously seeing and learning new things because they can are so familiar with most of the story already, that they can take in different parts of the story with each subsequent reading of it. They don’t need to worry about a huge amount of brand new information that is sometimes too much for one little brain to absorb in just one time of hearing a new story.

Repetition of the same story also creates the opportunity for your child to “fill in the blank”. You do this by reading the story and purposely leave out one word at the end of a sentence and wait for your child to tell you what that word should be. Take a nursery rhyme as an example; if you sing “twinkle, twinkle little……….” you know you that you just want to fill in the blank and say “star” (I bet you were singing the tune in your head too like I was!). You know the missing word because you’re so familiar with this nursery rhyme and for kids, it’s the same too, when they’ve heard it enough. Use this technique to get your child to use spoken words with predictable answers and help them grow their vocabulary and language.

8. Increase children’s ability to create and tell stories

Once children are using lots of words, encourage them to make up their own stories. You can start with simply seeing if they can fill in the words of a story they know well, or finish off your sentence (fill in the blank as per above example). This encourages them to start using their own words and start creating their own sentences. Older children may be able to predict what is going to happen next in the story or create their own ending. So even after you finish reading the story, ask them “what will happen next?” There is no real right or wrong answer here as they can make it up, as long as their response makes sense based on the existing story.

Another great task to practise creating your own stories, is to pick two characters out of the picture book and create a whole new story together. They don’t have to write the words themselves, but they could draw the pictures to create a new book and have your child tell the new story to other people in your family. Or they can use soft toys such as this fluffy green sheep to create their own version of the story. 

There you have it! 8 different ways to use picture books to help develop early language skills and it doesn’t require you sitting down for ages reading cover to cover! Now that you know how to use a book to help develop early language skills, pull out those books from the shelves and give it a go. Remember, reading with your child doesn’t always have to be about completing the whole story, you can use the pictures to talk about anything and everything. Model lots of language for your child to hear and learn. And most of all, when reading to your children, make it fun! Put on those funny character voices, make those silly faces and really engage your child. Happy reading!

Have you got a favourite picture book? Please share what you and your kids love to read so we can all get to know new favourites to add to our collections!

Monique Speakman
BA, MSpPathSt, CPSP, MSPA
Speech Language Pathologist

Monique Speakman is a Paediatric Speech Pathologist in Brisbane with over 14 years experience, mother of a son and twin daughters, business owner and blogger. She aims to educate parents about child development and communication through the Kids Chatter Speech Pathology Blog and Facebook Page and to provide information and tips on anything to do with Speech Pathology.

We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.  All opinions are my own.

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Why isn’t my toddler talking? Will they grow out of it or should I be concerned?

Speech therapist and toddler interacting

As a Speech Pathologist, probably the most common question that parents ask me, is “how many words should my child be saying?”.

You’ve probably noticed that there’s a big variety in development because you’ve seen other kids at your childcare centre, or kids at the park or even your own friend’s kids and some are talking a lot more and some are talking a lot less. So you’re probably questioning, well, what is normal? And if your toddler isn’t saying as much as their peers, you’re probably worried whether your child is behind for their age and would they catch up, or are they developing ok for their age.

Parents often ask their friends, their family or post in parent groups on Facebook asking whether they should be concerned about their child’s language development, and the common responses parents often receive are:

  • “Don’t worry, they’ll grow out of it.”
  • “They are fine. Every child develops at their own pace.”
  • “Don’t worry, boys talk later than girls.”
  • “My child didn’t say a word until she was 5 and then she started talking in full sentences overnight.”
  • “Just send them to childcare and they’ll learn to talk there.”
  • “Einstein didn’t speak until he was 4 and look at what he achieved.”

Sound familiar?

I Lonely toddlerknow this sort of ‘advice’ is well intentioned as most people just want to offer support and not make you worry any more, but this wait and see (and do nothing) approach can actually be quite detrimental in some cases. Now before you think I’m being over the top, let me help you by explaining what is considered normal/typical language development in children and what is not. I also want to explain the other developmental areas (besides just the number of words kids are saying) that we look at when it comes to a child’s communication development and more importantly WHY it’s so important to get it checked if there are concerns.

 

What is normal in a child’s early language development?

There are many markers in a child’s development that help us to work out if a child is delayed or if they’re on track with their development. Even though there will be some variety between children, typically developing children will follow the same sort of patterns within the same sort of age ranges.

Here is a breakdown of how many words children with typically developing language are using:

  • By 12 months children say 2 – 6 words other than “Mum” or “Dad”.
  • By 15 months children say 10 different words.
  • By 18 months children say 50 different words.
  • By 24 months children say 200 – 300 words.
  • By 30 months children say 450 words.
  • By 36 months children say 1,000 different words.

LinguiSystems Guide to Communication Milestones cites sources as Child Development Institute at www.childdevelopmentinfo.com. Nicolosi, Harryman, Kresheck (2006). Owens (1996).

Some parent will look at these numbers and think that their child isn’t saying as many words as they should, but because they understand everything that’s being said to them, they’re fine and will just catch up. Or because of the ‘advice’ that other people have given them as listed before, parents don’t think they need to worry because they will “just grow out of it”. Well, as a Speech Pathologist, this concerns me greatly. Not only is this advice given by people who are usually not trained professionals in early language development, but there are also a number of other factors to consider besides just how many words they are saying. There’s also the fact that parents (as well as some professionals), sometimes have a skewed perception of “normal” because we see so many children in our everyday interactions who have language delays and you may not even realise that they are in fact delayed. Speech Pathologist, Laura Mize explains this in further detail on her blog.

So what’s the risk? Don’t all kids learn to talk eventually?Statistics regarding language delays in children

Well, most likely, yes, however, research has proven to us that
when communication delays are left untreated in early childhood, the risk increases exponentially for future academic and learning issues. Learning to use and understand language is essential for nearly every other kind of learning a child needs, not just learning as a toddler, but also as they get older. When children don’t catch up in their language skills, they have ongoing language difficulties well into their school years, including difficulties with their reading and writing. So waiting to see whether or not a child will catch up on their own, is something I know I wouldn’t want to risk for my child when early intervention can make a huge difference.

Although it’s true that children will develop at their own pace and that the precise ages at which children reach a specific milestone, will vary somewhat, speech and language development is actually quite consistent and follows predictable patterns. Therefore, if certain milestones haven’t been reached by certain ages, it becomes cause for concern and it’s important to find out WHY a child isn’t reaching them.

What are the reasons why a child may not be talking?

A child’s language may be delayed due to a number of possibilities:

  1. Some children don’t have as much of a need to use their words to communicate because parents get very good at anticipating or guessing their child’s needs (you know what they want before they have to ask you).
  2. An older sibling might be doing a lot of the talking for them, so once again, they haven’t needed to talk as much themselves because they still get their needs met.
  3. Some children are not getting enough exposure to language in their environment or the language around them is not used at an age appropriate level for them to learn sufficiently.  
  4. Sometimes there could be more serious reasons as to why a child isn’t talking such as an undiagnosed hearing problem as a result of multiple ear infections over time, or a diagnosis of Autism or global developmental delays are also reasons as to why a child may not be talking.

Because there are a number of reasons as to why a toddler may not yet be talking, it is important to see a Speech Pathologist with experience in early language development to identify the cause of their language delay. Just counting the number of words they say is not the only factor in determining whether or not your child will be one of the lucky ones who may catch up in their own time, or whether they are the ones who need specific intervention to help them develop language because they won’t just grow out of it.  

What key areas do we look for when seeing a late talker?

When we see a toddler who isn’t talking much, we look at a number of areas to determine whether or not they are a TRUE ‘late talker’ or whether or not there might be something else going on.

A true late talker is a specific set of children as described by the following:

  • They are between the ages of 18 – 30 months
  • They have good understanding of language
  • They have typically developing play skills e.g. using toys appropriately, engage in pretend play
  • They have normal development in their fine and gross motor skills
  • They have normal thinking/cognitive skills
  • Have good social skills
  • Have limited spoken words

When we assess a child’s early language development, we look at the number and types of words a child may be saying, but we also look at the following skills to either rule out or confirm difficulties in other developmental areas:

  • Interaction skills
    • Do they want to interact with another person?
    • Do they initiate some form of communication such as pointing to something or making a sound to get your attention?
  • Eye contact
    • Do they look at the person they are communicating with?
    • Do they look at you while you are telling them something?
  • Non-verbal communication – what are they late talkers in speech therapy brisbanecommunicating without using spoken words?
    • Do they use gestures to communicate e.g. pointing to things, waving, pulling you towards the fridge if they’re hungry etc.?
  • Attention and listening skills
    • Do they respond to their name being called?
    • Do they turn to the person talking to them or do they ignore them completely?
  • Play skills
    • What is the level of the child’s play?
    • Do they know how to play with toys in the correct way e.g. build a tower with blocks and not just kick them around the room or just line up the blocks in a row?
    • Do they engage in play with another child/adult?
    • Do they get excited with trying new toys or show no interest at all because they’re fixated on one toy only?
  • Understand language
    • Do they understand what is said to them and follow instructions? Do they understand the words and phrases being used? There is a difference between situational understanding and understanding everything, so for example, if you fill the bath and say “let’s have a bath”, they don’t need to understand the specific words to be able to work out what’s going on.
  • How do they get their message across?
    • If they’re not using spoken words, how DO they get their message across e.g. gesturing (pointing, sign language) or do they throw tantrums and get frustrated or do they simply do nothing and move on to something else?

As you can see from the list above, there’s a lot more to communication than just the number of words being used. So when a child isn’t talking much, I cannot stress enough how important it is to seek advice from a Speech Pathologist to determine if a child is showing any other red flags in these areas of their development. We need to confirm which child is a true late talker who may grow out of it or needs a small amount of intervention with strategies to help develop their spoken language, versus a child who may have a more serious underlying diagnosis that will require a more in-depth treatment plan. Once we’ve worked out the missing pieces of the puzzle, we can help you and your child with their specific difficulties and prevent them from falling further behind in their development that will otherwise affect their academic success and everyday communication as they get older.

So if you have any concerns regarding your child or another parent is asking whether they should be concerned, please recommend them to speak to a Speech Pathologist as they are able to evaluate all the necessary developmental skills and give the best advice based on the child’s needs. To contact Kids Chatter, call us on 0432 735 044 if you have concerns about your child. We see lots of families in our clinic on a daily basis and have helped them with their language development. We know that early intervention works and using the right techniques and strategies can make a huge difference for your little one’s development.  

Monique Speakman
BA, MSpPathSt, CPSP, MSPA
Speech Language Pathologist

Monique Speakman is a Paediatric Speech Pathologist in Brisbane with over 10 years experience, mother of a son and twin daughters, business owner and blogger. She aims to educate parents about child development and communication through the Kids Chatter Speech Pathology Blog and Facebook Page and to provide information and tips on anything to do with Speech Pathology.

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Will my child grow out of a lisp?

All you need to know about lisps

I hear this question all the time from parents whose child has a lisp. Unfortunately, it’s not quite as simple to answer without explaining a few things first.

Have you ever noticed that your child is poking their tongue out when they’re speaking or that they sound “slushy”? Do you or other people find it difficult to understand their speech clearly? This could be a sign that your child has a lisp. 

Some parents already know their child is lisping, but you’d be surprised to hear how many parents never realised their child has a lisp. This is usually because they are so used to hearing their child’s speech every day (and they can usually still understand them), that this speech error goes unnoticed, or they don’t know what a lisp is. We successfully treat lisps on a daily basis in our clinic, plus we have a trained ear, so we can show you what to look and listen for.

What is a lisp?

There are in fact four different types of lisps, and this is why it isn’t always as straight-forward as people may assume.

Interdental lisp or also known as a frontal lisp
This lisp is probably the most common one children have and usually the one most people are familiar with. This is where the tongue sticks out between the front teeth on all /s/ and /z/ sounds, and essentially makes a sound like a /th/. So instead of “snake”, kids will say “thnake” or “bus” will sounds like “buth”. Children can also have an interdental production (i.e. putting the tongue between the teeth) for other sounds like /t/, /d/, /l/ and /n/. Check out the video below for an example.

Dentalised lisp
With this lips, the front of the tongue pushes against the inside of the front teeth and makes the /s/ and /z/ sounds quite muffled.

Lateral lisp
This lisp is usually described as a “slushy” or a “wet” lisp. This is because the airflow that’s produced for the /s/ and /z/ sounds, is coming out the sides of the mouth into the cheeks, rather than out the front/centre of the mouth where the airflow should be going. The lateral lisp can sometimes affect the /sh/, /ch/ and /j/ sounds as well.

Palatal lisp
This lisp occurs when the middle of the tongue touches the soft palate of the mouth. It’s really difficult to comprehend what that would sound like, but if you tried to say the /h/ sound closely followed by the /y/ sound, you would have a pretty good production of a palatal lisp.

Here is a video of my daughter Scarlett showing you what an interdental lisp looks and sounds like. She is currently attending speech therapy sessions to correct her lisp and I will begin a blog series to cover her progress over the coming weeks with hints and tips for you to try at home.

Other people tell me my child has a lisp, but I don’t hear it

Have you ever had to translate your child’s speech to another person because they had trouble understanding what they said? As a parent, you hear your child speak everyday, so you are familiar with how they sound, so you get pretty good at knowing what they’re saying. So it can come as a surprise sometimes that others find it difficult to understand your child or that you yourself don’t always realise your child actually has any speech errors until someone else points it out.

It depends on the severity of the lisp and how many sounds it’s affecting in a child’s speech, as to whether or not people have trouble understanding them. With children who only have a mild lisp on just the /s/ and /z/ sounds, you’ll probably find that despite this error, their overall clarity of speech isn’t affected too much. On the other hand, children with a significant lisp that’s affecting multiple sounds, can be much harder to understand, particularly for people who are not familiar with that child.

I will aim to answer the questions that you will mostly likely have, so hopefully by the end of this post, you’ll have a much better understanding of how to recognise if your child has a lisp, whether or not you should be worried, and more importantly, how we can fix this. If you have a question that I haven’t covered below, please comment on this post or get in contact with us and we will answer your questions.

Your lisp questions answered

What causes a lisp?
Lisping is NOT seen in typical speech development in children. It is a speech error that can happen for no reason sometimes and it’s just one of those things that some children have from the time they started to talk. Other times though, there may be an underlying cause such as a tongue thrust swallow. Prolonged dummy use or thumb sucking can also contribute to lisps as the continuous forward sucking motion of the tongue (as described in our tongue thrust post), can affect speech as well due to the muscle memory which can be very strong. It can happen to any child, for example my own daughter has an interdental lisp, and she has never sucked her thumb or a dummy, doesn’t have a tongue thrust swallow, and her mum is a speech pathologist!

Will my child grow out of a lisp?
In most cases, children will NOT grow out of a lisp! There are plenty of websites and other speech pathologists out there who say that children can grow out of a lisp, however I question how often that really happens, and here is why I think that… Because a lisp is a tongue placement issue and muscle memory is often our biggest enemy in treating it, unless someone has taught the child how to correctly say the /s/ and /z/ sounds, I wonder how we can expect children to correct this entirely on their own without any form of intervention? And out of all speech errors that people can have, one of the few that are carried through into adulthood, is a lisp (think Jamie Oliver). You don’t often hear an adult say “dod” for “dog” because they haven’t learned the /g/ sound… Both personally and professionally, I have never seen a lisp resolve on its own yet in the 17 years I’ve been working as a speech pathologist. Now that doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened, but those children who supposedly have grown out of it (I’d love to hear about them), did someone along the way show them how to make the sound correctly, or did they truly figure it out on their own? It’s often such an ingrained habit, it doesn’t just fix itself from one day to the next.

Why should my child need therapy to fix a lisp?
Ultimately, no one can force you or your child to do therapy, and having a lisp is probably not a big deal for some people in the big scheme of things. Having said that though, while some people will say it’s “cute” while they’re little, once children grow up into teenagers and adults, they are often teased or made fun of because they sound different. Sometimes there can also be the thought that someone with a lisp is not as intelligent as someone without a lisp (by the way, a lisp has no influence on intelligence at all!), but the reality is, that’s what some people assume if they don’t know anything about lisps. So think of the potential future consequences in adulthood if your child did not get their lisp corrected.

What is the best age to start therapy for a lisp?
This can vary depending on your child. Typically speaking, early intervention is the key, as the continuous movement of the tongue sticking out (interdental lisp) only reinforces this habit. The longer this habit remains (as with almost any habit), the more difficult it becomes to treat. Usually from 3.5 years of age onwards is a good time to start, bearing in mind the child’s maturity, personality, ability to follow instructions and attending to the task. If a child has a lateral lisp, which is definitely not considered as part of typical speech development, therapy is definitely recommended as soon as possible. At Kids Chatter, we see children as young as 3 years old for a lisp and have successfully fixed many children’s lisps.

Does a lisp affect a child's education? Kids Chatter Speech Pathology

Does a lisp affect my child’s education?
This can depend on the type and severity of the lisp. Having a lisp does not affect a person’s intelligence, so their ability to learn at school should not be affected. However, when a child is difficult to be understood by others, or the child is ashamed to speak up in class or if they are being bullied because of it, this can lead to them not wanting to participate in class, especially with things that require talking (oral presentations, reading aloud, answering questions etc.). So it’s usually the negative attention from the people around them that can result in a child struggling at school because they don’t want to talk. The social pressure can be huge for some children and we all know how mean some kids can be to others.

My child can say a proper /s/ sound on its own, so why aren’t they using it in their everyday talking? Are they just being lazy?
I can assure you, they are not being lazy! It takes quite a bit of effort and practise to change a long term habit into a new one. Especially in this case, where muscle memory is our biggest enemy, it’s not going to happen overnight unfortunately. As I often explain to the parents in our clinic, imagine if you, who can (presumably) say the /s/ sounds clearly, were suddenly expected to say all your words with a lisp on all /s/ and /z/ sounds (remember, they occur at the beginning, middle and end of words), could you do it? Chances are you probably can’t! We are essentially expecting our kids to do the same, but in reverse. This is why in speech therapy, we teach the child and their parents the systematic steps to get from that single sound all the way up through to conversational level. At Kids Chatter, we follow our Articulation Tracker that we have designed to show you exactly where your child is up to and what steps we still have to get through to work towards the ultimate goal of everyday conversation.

How do I know if it’s truly a lisp and not something else?
Hopefully, this post has given you some information about what a lisp is and how to recognise it. If you still find it difficult to identify what your child’s speech errors really are though, because it may not be an exact match of any of the descriptions above, then the best thing you can do is see a speech pathologist. We will be able to check exactly what type of lisp your child has, or identify if there’s another problem. If the errors are considered age appropriate, then we can monitor it over time, or if they are not age appropriate, we can discuss how we can treat it.

Can a lisp be fixed?
Yes! With the right speech therapy, motivation, practise and a bit of time, lisps can usually be successfully treated. You want to ensure though that if there’s an underlying cause for the lisp such as a tongue thrust swallow, that this problem is also addressed as in this case, the lisp is more of a symptom of tongue thrust, rather than the lisp being a problem on its own. So make sure your speech pathologist is qualified and experienced in checking for a tongue thrust swallow (very few speech pathologists actually have experience with this area) to rule it out or identify and treat accordingly. Thankfully at Kids Chatter, we deal with lots of children who have tongue thrust swallows, which can also be treated successfully.

If you’d like to purchase your own /s/ and /z/ articulation cards, you can find them on the Teachers Pay Teachers website. In order to buy from Teachers Pay Teachers, you will need to create a free account.

My child’s front teeth are missing, will that cause them to lisp?
If a child does not already have an existing lisp and then they lose their front baby teeth, then theoretically there should be no reason why they should start lisping. Because the /s/ and /z/ sounds are TONGUE sounds, and not specifically teeth sounds, it is the tongue position that is important, whether or not there are teeth present. Now, it is quite likely that the quality of /s/ and /z/ sounds will change a little because the teeth do help in making it sound “hissy”, but most children adjust quite well and continue to use their tongue in their correct spot despite the gap.

My child’s front teeth are missing, does that mean they can’t do therapy?
As per the question above, the /s/ and /z/ sounds are based on tongue position, so it can be possible to do speech therapy to treat a lisp. However, if your child is new the speech therapy when they have a gap, sometimes we may recommend to wait until the teeth do grow back, because it will make it a little easier, especially when trying to achieve that “hissy” sound, but if they are already receiving therapy when their baby teeth fall out, they can usually continue. The speech pathologist can usually give you more specific advice based on your child’s circumstances.

Why do some adults still have a lisp?
Without intervention, lisps can persist into adulthood, especially for those children who have never been to speech therapy or didn’t complete all their therapy. Some adults have accepted their speech the way it is and have no desire to fix it, while others are really bothered by it and want to be able to fix it. Adults can attend speech therapy to treat a lisp and it works much the same as how we would treat it in children, probably minus the kid’s games though!

So, a lisp can sometimes be a very straight forward problem, while at other times it can be a little more complicated if we’re dealing with a lateral lisp or an underlying problem like a tongue thrust swallow. If you think/know that your child has a lisp, contact us for an assessment to determine what type of lisp your child has and we can explain how we can fix it as the longer a lisp is left untreated, the harder it can be to correct. If there is no lisp or other speech errors, we can reassure you that your child’s speech development is doing just fine and there is nothing to worry about. Should speech therapy be recommended and your child is ready, motivated and you can are able to commit to doing the follow-up homework practise, I believe the earlier therapy is started, the better the outcome will be and it will save you time and money in the long run.

If you found this post useful or you know someone with a child who has a lisp, please share this post so we can help other families.

Monique Speakman
BA, MSpPathSt, CPSP, MSPA
Speech Language Pathologist

Monique Speakman is a Paediatric Speech Pathologist in Brisbane with over 15 years experience, mother of a son and twin daughters, business owner and blogger. She aims to educate parents about child development and communication through the Kids Chatter Speech Pathology Blog and Facebook Page and to provide information and tips on anything to do with Speech Pathology.

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How well do you know the people behind the business?

So nice to meet you Kids Chatter Speech Pathology So most companies who have a website for their (small) business, will usually put up a page about their staff members and write a little about each person. We have a team page too which has a little bit about each of our speech pathologists, but it’s mostly information about their professional history and what speciality areas they have an interest in. It’s all very relevant and important information, but how much do you really get to know the people behind the business? So I thought we’d introduce ourselves so you can get to know us better. This can also help your kids in knowing a little more about the person they’re going to see when they first come to Kids Chatter as you can show a photo to them or share some common interests that we may have. Particularly for those kids who may be a little shy when meeting new people or are just curious about the new person they’re going to see.

As the founder and director of Kids Chatter Speech Pathology, I thought I would start with myself – Monique Speakman. And yes, as many people often ask, that is truly my surname. My wonderful husband Marc gave me his name when we got married 14 years ago and with a name like that, it was just meant to be!

Outside of Kids Chatter, I’m a mum to 3 wonderful kids. My oldest is 12 year old Lucas and my 10 year old twin daughters are Scarlett and Alyssa. Having been a parent of school aged kids (both primary and high school), it’s been an eye opener as both a parent and a Speech Pathologist to see how kids actually settle into school when they start Prep and continue their journey as a school kid. I have volunteered at my son’s school in the early years so I got to see how classrooms actually run day to day and how the teachers do a wonderful job to try and cater for 20+ students with varying abilities and learning styles.

Interdental lisp cartoon Kids Chatter Speech Pathology When my twins were little, we worked on their lisp with speech therapy exercises as both my girls had one since they started to talk. Unfortunately, a lisp is something kids generally don’t grow out of on their own, so they needed help them to correct it. Even though they have never sucked their thumb, rarely used a dummy and have a mother who is a Speech Pathologist, they still ended up with a lisp. It just goes to show that sometimes children have speech errors without any specific cause, and there was nothing I could’ve done to prevent it. I can however, fix it!

Scarlett also used to have a stutter around the age of 3, which started to worry me quite a bit. So I got onto it straight away and we managed to get rid of the stutter all together after only a few weeks. She had a little relapse with her stutter when we moved house as it was such a big change in our routine, but we quickly managed to get it under control again and now you couldn’t even tell she ever had a stutter. For a while though, I must say I got quite worried myself thinking her stutter was only getting worse. I got first hand experience as a parent to know what it was like to see your own child struggle so much to get their words out and seeing her get so frustrated by it. It was just heart wrenching to see. I have treated many kids with stutters in my clinic before and had heard the worries from parents, but until you’ve actually gone through it yourself, it’s not quite the same in understanding what it’s truly like.

Kids Chatter has been a growing dream of mine since I started it in 2013. It’s been an amazing journey to start something from scratch and have it grow into the amazing clinic that it is today. There are many more big plans ahead in the future and the kids and parents we meet make coming to work every day a joy! It is truly a passion of mine to be able to help kids develop confidence and see them achieve new skills to help them thrive. For those people who have already been part of the Kids Chatter journey, thank you for your support and amazing feedback. For those families who we have yet to meet, I look forward to having you on board and to see your child flourish.

See you in our next blog!

Don’t forget to check out the Therapies pages for loads of information about the areas we can help your child with. There you’ll find information about what the signs are to look out for and why those skills are important.

Monique Speakman
BA, MSpPathSt, CPSP, MSPA
Speech Language Pathologist

Monique Speakman is a Paediatric Speech Pathologist in Brisbane with over 15 years experience, mother of a son and twin daughters, business owner and blogger. She aims to educate parents about child development and communication through the Kids Chatter Speech Pathology Blog and Facebook Page and to provide information and tips on anything to do with Speech Pathology.

Contact

Phone 0432 735 044
Email info@kidschatter.com.au
Facebook www.facebook.com/kidschattersp