Deciding what you want to be when you “grow up” is often one of the most difficult decisions a person makes. For some it comes easily, but from my experience most people just aren’t sure and change their mind often. In this third part of the series in which we asked our expert Speech-Language Pathologists (SLPs) for their feedback, we wanted to know what advice they have for someone …
speech language therapist
The Effect of Covid on Speech Therapy
Kids Who Need Speech Therapy In An (Almost) Post Pandemic World In this first of a three part series of blog posts, we reached out to several of the speech therapists we have been privileged to work with, and asked them for some feedback to share with our families and supporters. The first question we asked is, What effects have you seen on students since the impact of …
A Golf Social Story
The Orange Effect Foundation just completed their 15th Annual Golf for Autism outing. It was a huge success and one of their two big golf fundraising events that provide funding for children who need speech therapy. I am not a golfer but volunteered to help out for this event – you know, selling raffle tickets, taking pictures, and of course, serving beer – things I know very well how to …
Speech Language Therapist Appreciation Day
The month of May brings so many things--signs of summer, graduations, weddings, and so much more. May is also Better Hearing and Speech Month. Part of that is Speech Language Therapist (SLP) Appreciation day on May 18. SLPs are VERY important to us here at the Orange Effect Foundation. One example of this is that every application is required to involve a therapist who is certified by the …
Speech Therapy for Those Who Speak English as a Second Language
Languages across the world have unique phonemic systems. For individuals learning English as a second language, it is common for the phonemic system of their first language to influence the production of sounds in English. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) has excellent resources for working with speech language clients for whom English is not their first language. ASHA …
How to Write Excellent Speech Therapy Goals
The goals of speech therapy are what drives the child's progress and determine the course of therapy. With this being said, it is quite clear that writing great speech therapy goals matters more than people think. The goals are important for each participant in the therapy as you all get a chance to measure the success and exude motivation when the set objectives are achieved. But what if …
Navigating Our New Normal
I had (socially distanced) coffee with a mom last month who reached out because she couldn’t decide if in person or remote learning would be best for her autistic daughter. As we got to talking she mentioned that they had to stop speech therapy because of the pandemic. I was surprised her SLP (Speech Language Pathologist) hadn’t offered online sessions. The mom admitted that she didn’t really …
Communication is Essential
It has always been my belief that communication is the most essential component to life and human relationships. Communication may be conducted in various forms, i.e., via verbal expression, body language, eye contact, sign language, written message, gestures, speech generated devices, text. To express oneself is half of communicating, while the other half is receiving or understanding …
Does Your Child Need a Speech Evaluation?
If you're like many parents, you own a parenting book or two (or three!) that carefully describes important developmental milestones in your child's life. Using these as a guide, you anticipate your baby's first smile, first steps, first word. While so many of these milestones are given a very broad time frame ("between ages 1 and 3 your child will grow a full set of 20 teeth") others are much …