Favorite Therapy Item Thursday: Kelly from Speech2u talks about Speech-Pictures! Analysis & Therapy by Char Boshart, SLP

Hi! I'm Kelly from Speech2u. I'm excited to share one of my favorite therapy products with you. Admittedly, I have a lot of favorites. I love games and toys cool and crafty Pinterest projects. I chose the ebook, Speech-Pictures! Analysis & Therapy by Char Boshart, MA CCC-SLP because it is a lifesaver for me when I have a client or student who is just NOT making progress with their articulation.



I've taken several classes from Char Boshart and highly recommend attending one if she comes to your area. She is an excellent presenter and I learned so much about articulation and the motor component for speech. I'm tongue-tied and it was in her class that I first realized most people can use their tongue to clear all the food in their mouth-including the food by their molars. I was really geeking out in her class.

I don't use this book with every client or student-I'm guessing I use it with about 5-10 percent of my caseload. Here's what I think is great about it. The beginning includes about pages of lingual capacity activities. I know that Oral motor therapy is considered controversial-but these are activities on a hierarchy-that are designed to teach the placement. If a child can't elevate his back tongue-he's probably not going to achieve a good /k/ or /r/ sound.

These activities work better one on one-and it is nice to get carryover at home-but I'm usually done with the program in about 2-4 weeks. I had a client years ago who was came to me at a private clinic where I used to work. He was going into second grade and was still fronting his /k/ and /g/s. He'd had other outpatient therapy and he was getting services in the schools. Knowing that he'd had speech therapy for probably 5 years, I knew that his therapist had tried all of the conventional tricks-and it was time to try something different. So we worked on the lingual capacity activities for back tongue movement. It took three weeks with the parents practicing at home-but we were able to get him producing the /k/ sound in all word positions. It doesn't work this great for every student or client-but it works for at least 50% of them which is awesome!

The second half of the book consists of in depth analysis of how we produce each sound as well as teaching tips and hierarchies for each sound. Each sound (r, s, sh, ch, t, d, k, g, f, v, th, l) is broken down by each articulator (ex. how does the jaw, sides of the tongue, mid tongue and tongue tip/lips move to produce each sound.) Common errors or distortions are discussed with potential treatment activities. Specific information on how hard or soft tissue abnormalities can impact speech are included along with possible compensatory treatment techniques.

The ebook costs $20.00 which is money well spent if you have ever had a tricky client or student who just wasn't making progress with their articulation goals.

Disclaimer-I am not affiliated with Char Boshart and did not receive any compensation for this review. I just really liked her book and wanted to share it with others.