Kindergarten speech help please

[dcjlkplus3]

I just started teaching my dd5 to read, we are starting slow with OPGTR. She really wants to learn to read. However she is getting frustrated (me too, but her more) because she can't say all of the sounds correctly. She speaks kind of like she has an accent (has a hard time with v, r, l especially). I think she hears them okay, but she can't pronounce them right. Has anyone dealt with this successfully? I don't want to keep frustrating her, but I don't want her to give up just because its challenging. It keeps coming back in my mind to "but, she really wants to learn how to read!"

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I just started teaching my dd5 to read, we are starting slow with OPGTR. She really wants to learn to read. However she is getting frustrated (me too, but her more) because she can't say all of the sounds correctly. She speaks kind of like she has an accent (has a hard time with v, r, l especially). I think she hears them okay, but she can't pronounce them right. Has anyone dealt with this successfully? I don't want to keep frustrating her, but I don't want her to give up just because its challenging. It keeps coming back in my mind to "but, she really wants to learn how to read!"

My youngest had speech issues well into his kindergarten year. In fact I took him for an audio exam and a speech assessment. For him, it was turned out to be mostly an issue of maturity and our taking the time to stop and correct him and be more clear in our own speech.
I actually saw that learning the phonics was helping his speech. I think the different symbols helped him "see" that there were different sounds.
I would also recommend a lot of reading aloud. Kids have an easier time reading words that they've already "met" in stories they've heard.
With some kids reading is a layer by layer, step by step marathon before it clicks. There is nothing wrong with hanging out at one level of ability for a while until the next developmental gate opens.

[Qs3]

I am experiencing this also with my dd5. I recently bought a book called Teach Me How to Say It Right: Helping Your Child With Articulation Problems. I'm only a little ways into it, but it's been very helpful so far. :)

[dcjlkplus3]

I am experiencing this also with my dd5. I recently bought a book called Teach Me How to Say It Right: Helping Your Child With Articulation Problems. I'm only a little ways into it, but it's been very helpful so far. :)

I just reserved the book from the library and hope it has some good ideas.
Now to decide about stepping back and slowing down or continuing on. She can say her vowels, but not the word vowel and it frustrates her.:001_smile:

[CookieMonster]

Mispronouncing l, v, and r is not uncommon for a Kindergarten-aged child.

My son is 4, is learning to read with OPGTR, and has had speech therapy for the past two years. He only, just recently, graduated as "age-appropriate" with his speech, which means he has all of the "normal" hang-ups an "average" four-year-old may have. For instance, he cannot correctly pronounce /th/ (either way). Therefore, when he reads the sight word "the" it sounds like "vee" or sometimes "dee".

I've never said a word to him about it. He sees "the" and he vocalizes "vee" and I never try to correct him. When he can say /th/, I'll have him start reading /th/. (Although direct instruction on my part will probably be completely unnecessary. He should transfer the new skill in speech directly into his oral reading.)

I guess that would be my recommendation to you, if you're not already doing it. Ignore the mispronunciation. Just because she's mispronouncing it, doesn't mean she's not actually reading. She is. She is just not yet capable of pronouncing it.

Also, if you've been trying to have her say it correctly, I would make a point of giving positive feedback every single time she reads a word you previously would have stopped on. Just give her a great big, "That's great! Good reading!" This will help with the confidence level and help her to like reading again.

One more thing. If you are worried about her speech - as in you really feel it's not normal whatever anyone might tell you - get her evaluated. A few months of speech therapy with a good therapist can work absolute wonders.

HTH

[keptwoman]

I think the issue is that sometimes mispronouncing leads to children writing the words incorrectly because if they say wun for run they will quite likely try and spell it wun.

I was concerned about DD for the same reason so I took some time and remediated it myself. Can she actually say the sound in isolation? If so you could probably sort the problem out yourself. PM me if you want to know how I did it. If not I would take her to see an SLT.

[midwestbelle]

and he is reading fairly well - I don't correct his pronunciation. He has had no trouble in spelling the words. When he pronounces a word, he thinks he's saying it just like I do. My best friend is a speech therapist but lives several states away or I would have her over here helping me! She told me that the "r" isn't a concern until age 8. I had trouble with it as a child and went to speech therapy in 2nd grade. My practice sentence was "the red rabbit ran down the road in the rain" Funny how I still remember that! I have noticed that when we are working on just phonograms in SWR, he does a better job at pronouncing the sounds than he does when reading or talking, so I was thinking that the more we practiced the phonograms individually it would train his tongue and eventually spill over to his speech and reading.

Good Luck

[StephanieF]

My 5 yr old also doesn't say "th" but "vuh" because he doesn't stick his tounge out when he should. I do correct him but he goes back to his old way of doing it. Not sure whether we need to see a speech therapist?
Stephanie

[jennyt]

Hi,

I've been trying to avoid speech therapy for ds4 but I managed to get quite a bit of material off a few friends whose kids were doing speech therapy. The main thing that is working wonders with ds4 is games - we played a memory game with a pack of 12 pairs of words starting with s (home made) and after a few weeks of that (he would have to concentrate on putting his tongue in just the right place every time he said one of the words), his s's have improved no end. I found out later that s is usually one of the last they work on because it is so hard. At the moment, we are playing memory with a pack of r words - his own name is Russell, which, from when he started to speak, he pronounced "Waddil" - you can see why I ended up starting with s and r!! People would ask him his name and then look blankly at me for the translation. Now, I never have to translate for people - I'm very proud of him! He's come a long way in a couple of months.

HTH,

Jenny

[CookieMonster]

My 5 yr old also doesn't say "th" but "vuh" because he doesn't stick his tounge out when he should. I do correct him but he goes back to his old way of doing it. Not sure whether we need to see a speech therapist?
Stephanie

If this is the only speech utterance issue your 5yo has, I don't think speech therapy is necessary.

If he is capable of producing the sound correctly, when he stops and thinks about it, he is on his way to assimilating the sound into all his speech. First, a child learns a sound in isolation, during instruction. Then he learns to form the sound with his tongue/mouth/vocal cords in a word, during instruction. Then he learns to form the sound in a phrase, during instruction. Then he transfers the sound to sentences, during instruction. Finally, he begins transfering the sound outside of direct instruction, to words, phrases, and sentences in everyday life. Over time, the new motor skill will become firmly rooted and the wrong utterance will no longer be heard.

If you would like to work with your son on this sound, do it outside of reading instruction. Spend five minutes a day, perhaps twice a day if you're ambitious and your son doesn't object, working on the sound. I think the simplest and most direct way to work with him would be to engage him in an activity he enjoys and incorporate his corrrect pronunciation into the activity.

For instance, my son likes playing certain games. One way to get him to practice a sound was to have him say it correctly before he could take his turn. I would already have a word list, phrase list, or sentence list to draw examples from for the sound we were practicing. Sometimes we would play with a toy he loved, but take breaks every few minutes. During those breaks we would work on four or five words, phrases, or sentences. (The speech therapist had to use this quite often with my son.)

Does that help? I hope I didn't give you a bunch more than you wanted Stephanie :o.

[StephanieF]

Those were great ideas, thanks!
Stephanie