Speech-language therapy involves the assessment and treatment of difficulties relating to verbal and nonverbal communication, including augmentative communication.
The Language in speech-language pathology is made up rules that include the following:
- The meaning of words (e.g., “star” can refer to a bright object in the night sky or a celebrity)
- How to make new words (e.g., friend, friendly, unfriendly)
- How to put words together (e.g., “Peg walked to the new store” rather than “Peg walk store new”)
- What word combinations are best in what situations (“Would you mind moving your foot?” could quickly change to “Get off my foot, please!” if the first request did not produce results)
The Speech in speech-language pathology is the verbal means of communicating. Speech consists of the following:
- Articulation: How speech sounds are made (e.g., children must learn how to produce the “r” sound in order to say “rabbit” instead of “wabbit”).
- Voice: Use of the vocal folds and breathing to produce sound (e.g., the voice can be abused from overuse or misuse and can lead to hoarseness or loss of voice).
- Fluency: The rhythm of speech (e.g., hesitations or stuttering can affect fluency).
Speech therapy also addresses feeding and swallowing difficulties. Speech therapy can help children improve:
- Oral motor strength and awareness
- Articulation (forming and producting sounds correctly)
- Stuttering/fluency
- Expressive language (formulating thoughts, ideas, questions, answers)
- Receptive language (understanding spoken language)
- Pragmatic language (social skills)
- Phonological awareness (an important pre-reading skill)