Children with Communication, Language, and Speech Disorders

• special education
• Year 1

Children with Communication, Language, and Speech Disorders 

What are some speech disorders?

History of Communication, Language, and Speech Disorders

• The formation of the American Speech and Hearing Association (ASHA) attempts to correct speech patterns and enhance communication. 
• In the United States during the 1800s, the focus was on elocution, or the ability to speak with elegance. With the emergence of public schools, a curriculum of elocution was developed and some attention was given to students with speech impediments. 
• Alexander Graham Bell founded the School of Vocal Physiology in 1872 to help improve the speech of children who were deaf or who suffered from stuttering and or articulation problems. 

What is Communication?

• Communication is an exchange of thoughts, information, feelings, and ideas and it requires 3 things: a sender, a message, and a receiver. 
  
• The sender initiates the communication and determines the message, and the receiver gets the message and must interpret it to understand what it means, thus completing the communication loop. 
• Communication is important to our ability to fit into society successfully and when difficulties with language and speech interfere with communication, children often experience problems. These problems can affect children's friendships, schools success, and self-esteem. 

Speech Disorders

• Speech disorders may include problems with articulation and phonological processing, voice, and/or fluency, and may originate because of a physical anomaly such as a cleft palate.
• A cleft palate is when the roof of the mouth has not joined completely during development. 
• The repair of a child's cleft palate is essential to a child's language development. 

How Parents Can Support Their Child’s Communication

• When adults follow the child’s lead, talking about what the child is interested in, the child is likely to be more engaged in the conversation and will use and learn more words.
• Also support them along their journey and encourage them to speak.