Articulation Disorders

What is it?...Three Criterion:

~The speech problem affects speaking and listening or phonology
~The speech problem arose during childhood, contains patterns similar to those
found in normally developing young children, and is not attributable solely to the
physical damage of the motor or sensory systems
~The speech problem is not the result of a dialect or non-English-language
influences and is considered a disorder by either the client or the members of the
clients community
It is said that a person with an articulation disorder has a motor (movement)
component to the disorder that affects an ability to clearly articulate specific
sounds and words
Etiology:
~Girls are typically more advanced than boys in their articulation skills at most age
levels.
~Children who have IQs lower than 70 have a higher risk of having an articulation
disorder.
In order to diagnose:
As the SLP, you must

Describe the speech and language development and status of the child
Determine whether the childs speech and language sufficiently deviates
from normal expectations to warrant concern or intervention
Identify factors that relate to the presence or maintenance of the speech
and/or language disorder
Determine the direction of treatment
Make a prognostic judgment about change with and without intervention

Monitor changes in speech and language abilities and performance across

time
Some therapy techniques:

~Be a scientist, a humanist, and an artist:

-Scientists: Have good understanding of the anatomy and physiology of the
speech system and nervous system, as well as speech and language development and
base our therapy on well-researched data.
-Humanist: We work with people, therefore we need to be empathic and try
to understand what our clients are going through.
-Artists: A big part of our job is being flexible and creative. We need to be
able to think on our feet and be able to go from moment to moment, rather than
having a robotic therapy session.
~Treatment Efficacy:
-Using evidence-based practice is extremely important when basing your therapy
techniques
~Phonetic Motor Treatment:
-Focuses on the mechanic of producing the speech sounds
~No matter what type of therapy technique, the goals should always be:
To become aware of characteristics of the standard phoneme
To recognize characteristics of misarticulations and how they differ from
the target sound
To produce the standard sound at will, and to stabilize or strengthen the
use of the target sound in isolation, syllables, words, phrases, and sentences
To use the standard sound in spontaneous speech of all kinds and under all
conditions; that is, to achieve carryover
Explaining Articulation Disorders to Your Clients Parents
It is important to be able to explain what articulation disorders are in terms that
your client or clients parents can understand. Something that can be explained to
them is that articulation disorders simply means that there are certain sounds in
the English language and when we arent making those target sounds, it can turn
into an articulation disorder. Its important to know that almost all kids with have

some sort of articulation errors because children are developing and learning how
to talk. However, its beneficial to apply early intervention and help prevent any
crucial articulation errors that could lead to teasing and/or psychological and
emotional issues because of it.
Resources
www.asha.org
http://www.kidspeech.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=46&Ite
mid=492
http://www.home-speech-home.com/articulation-disorders.html

References
All information was gathered from:
Fogle, P. T. 2008. Foundations of Communication Sciences & Disorders. Delmar.