Apraxia

That’s fantastic that he signed “spilled water on socks” to you. Keep going! It may feel slow but remember that as soon as you start to understand his words, he’ll drop the sign. My dd had 3 clear words at 3…the rest was gibberish to our ears.

I had more thoughts…cod liver oil is great for kids with apraxia…higher doses too. Also, does he talk a lot while laying down? Do you hike, swim, horse ride? Building his core helps towards building his fine motor/mouth.

Hi Laurie. That’s great that he’s making progress and initiating! Please make sure you like his new therapist and agree with her approach…ask questions and if you feel it’s a rocky relationship with your son in any way you are allowed to request a different therapist (just so you know).

Books can take time especially for some boys. He is soooo young so take one day at a time. I, too, was very anxious to get to the longer, meatier books with my kiddos. I tried and it didn’t work so now we do longer picture books. But at 3, my dd couldn’t sit for long either. I just kept reading aloud and a little more animated than most. What are some titles you are trying to read to him right now?

Audiobooks are great in the car..they have no choice but to listen. Offer variety and he may surprise you. Can he follow a fast-talker? That may be a reason he doesn’t like music too…not able to “hear” it as it goes too fast. Classical?

Have you figured out what he wants in the mornings? Can you offer him pictures on the fridge of typical choices he would make in the morning? Let me know if you need me to explain how you introduce it to him.

I, too, wondered if CM would be a good fit for my dd and I am happy to say that she is doing wonderful! We are also doing a home therapy program called Neurodevelopment therapy with a group called Hope and a Future.

Please do not look too far into the future because he may grow leaps and bounds at a point. Your sticking to the books he enjoys and slowly training him to go a little further will help him make that growth so much easier/faster. You will have to push him a little but go slowly. Picture books are okay and if he enjoys them keep it up…instill his love of learning.

Does that help?

Hi Laurie!  I’m so happy to hear that you’re seeing progress.  This may sound like a silly question but with all that you’re working on with him why are you concerned with him saying the alphabet?  Can you just teach him the letter sounds without the pressure of him saying them?  And then when he feels comfortable, he’ll attempt the sound.  It’s kind of the same thought with sign language.  They drop the sign when they are being understood verbally.  He’ll chime in with the sound when he can.  It just takes that pressure off of him.  It’s all hard work so if you’re focusing on other areas with him this may just need to wait until he’s ready.

Otherwise, here are some ideas.

Play fish with letter cards and you only refer to the sound.

Sing the abc song sloooowly and take turns saying each sound (so you’re using the tune not the actual song)

We sang silly songs just to get the sound in there…what kid can resist singing!  After some success with that you can show them the letter it belongs to.

ABeCeDarian is a wonderful reading program that my dd is using.  It really emphasizes letter sound isolation (works well for dyslexics apparently).

Keep us posted!

Hi Laurie.  I hope I wasn’t discouraging.  I had to learn to accept where my child was rather than where I wanted her to be.  It’s good to push them in that direction and waiting for them to be ready is hard.  I just try to remind myself that it’s so much harder to do things myself when I’m not ready.  My dd8 still can’t rhyme.  I’ll say hi and she can’t name a rhyming word.  I gave up and moved onto other skills.  We’ll try again some other time.

I also learned that that we need to work on things that she is good at rather than focus on all her needs.  It took a few years for her to be good at something!

Keep up the good work!

We also have a kid with apraxia, who is now 7.  The majority of people can no longer notice his issues, but as his parents we are more in tune.  When he gets tired, his speech really suffers, though sometimes it is just plain old apraxia – beginning/end of words being dropped, slight pauses while he looks for an alternative word to say (rather than stammering over the original word he wanted), mix up of sounds (shunshine instead of sunshine), having to break down longer words (today’s apraxic word pronunciation of the day – um-br-ella, not umbellam) Since not all these show up at once and he can now say complex sentences, most people don’t notice.  The change from age 3 to 4.5 was huge. Mainly we saw lits of small progress that gave us hope, and he noticed too. He went to a local Early Childhood preschool for 3 hours a day and we focused a lot on speech at home, encouragung use of words/signs.  The tantrums were trying but now only appear when his brain is tired.

Over the past few years, I have learned that songs and stories work well in teaching him new concepts.  Online videos have been great to introduce new concept or reinforce others.  Days of the week, months of the year, counting to 100 by 10’s – all sung + learned while brushing teeth.

Adding a ‘u’ with ‘q’ – “q is shy. Why? His tail is backwards! He thinks it looks funny, so he doesn’t like to go out.  However, his friend U is such a good friend and does not mind Q’s tail.  Because of U being such a great friend Q is able to go out, but only when U also goes.  You will never see him without his great friend U.”. That was the story I told to get him to remember how to write the letter Q and how to spell words with it in there (queen, quiet, etc.)

We are also currently struggling with math.  Not sure how to unlock the understanding there, but we keep trying.

It can be very frustrating when the thing you have been working to learn, which finally was learned, was forgotten because you try to learn another new thing and the brain ‘had to make room for the new data.’

As for reading and speech, my hope had been that reading would help.  It has to an extent, as we can sound out words or write simple ones to clarify.  However, my son is by far NOT a strong reader and struggles with fluid reading.  My 5 year old is much better, which only highlughts the weakness.

Each kid is different, which is so frustrating to hear.  We have noticed a good change with fish oils (DHA), thanks to a docs recommendation, so those are taken daily along with a multivitamin.

We also do school work as early as possible so his brain is not tired, before breakfast time is good, but definitely before lunch.

We like to play the game where I say a word and they guess the beginning letter, or the ending letter, whichever we are working on.  Then we switch it up and I give a sound/letter and they find a word.  A good game for the car or while waiting somewhere, or walking past signs.

Oh, and for some sounds (/th/, /sh/,etc.) I have also had to come up with short stories to help remember movements – “/sh/, like grandma kisses “, for example.  Or /g/ is down in your throat like you swallowed it.

Every new sound, word, sign is a success.  Praise them all and keep encouraging.  Our kids may not learn the same way, so don’t stress about trying to teach the same way you might for a typical kid. Have fun with it.

For ABCs I try as many versions as I know, so I can sung them all and it is like 3 songs instead of 1 being repeated.  The first is the traditional version, then one we learned at church (it has extra phrases between certain letters), and the one from Super Why!.

Sometimes we sing a song I learned as a kid from Sesame Street that counts from 1-12.

With all songs, I slow them down as necessary.  Makes you, as the singer, really think about the music.

Head andshoulders, knees and toes …

I get a lot from YouTube – days of the week, 2-d shapes, months of the year, counting songs, songs about the seasons…. As my kids have gotten older we moved into months of the year, 3-d shapes, add/subtract, phonics (mainly when an e makes a vowel say its name and when there are two vowels together), etc.

We also sing the books of the Bible.  My apaxic kid learned the New Testament ones and earned ice cream.  🙂 I was not a stickler on pronunciation, as long as I knew that the name was trying to be said it counted. I made up hand motions for the NT ones to help as visual cues, but have no idea what to do for the OT.

Amazon has several free MP3s of folk music. Some they liked, some not.  We also used these to go with our Bible times, as I could find the stories which usually had a song too.

I feel like there was so much more I could have done if only I had time and knew where to look. Often I feel like I am a step behind and wonder why it took me so long to think of something or find it.

As for q being shy, it was a moment if frustration actually.  He could not remember how to write it, or even tell me how, even though we had been going over and over it. As I was thinking my brain says, “doesn’t he see it is like a g, only with a backwards tail?  Hmm. Backwards people areusually shy.” So I started talking without really thinking, and told him a story.  As it grew I realized I could work spelling/reading into there also by adding u.

One recommended method for reading is to create pictures with the words and stories.  It helps it stick on the right side of the brain and go to the left.  I’m not on my home computer and the name of this escapes me at the moment. Sorry.

As for having g the right song or thing to teach, iworry too, but finally realized this stuff would need to be known at some point.  If it is too early, well, there are worse things in life.  We can fill in gaps later.

Keep looking and asking, that is something I wish I did or even knew if others to ask from. Keep searching and don’t give up.  Since each kid is different and progresses differently what others do or deal with may not be where you are.  Learn and adapt to your needs or ignore when necessary.  You are doing great just by looking for ideas.