Speech Evals

[k3am]

DD is a little over a year from her craniotomy and resection. She was a little under age 3 at the time of surgery and is now just a little over 4. She's recovered quite remarkably, and we couldn't be happier with her progress. 

Last December, she did a neuropsych exam, which showed no signs of autism or ADHD (both things that are common in epilepsy/brain surgery patients), but some speech articulation issues. She was on the low-end age wise for the exam, so the examiner couldn't really get a good grasp on her articulation since she wasn't talking to her all that much. They suggested that we reassess after kindergarten (she'd be almost 6.5 at the time). 

As she's becoming more and more vocal and her peers are getting older and more vocal, I'm realizing now that the gap between where they're at and where she's at is getting larger. When DH first started broaching the subject, I assumed it was just baby talk and normal and she'd grow out of it. Granted, not all that much time has passed (4 months), but I'm wondering if it's time to escalate.

www.talkingchild.com/speechchart.html I've been pointed in the direction of this chart, and honestly, I have a hard time comprehending it. 

She can say most individual letter sounds on her own, but really has problems combining them. She'll often say a word and we'll have to spend a couple minutes trying to figure out what it is. And it's not anything complicated, it's spider or glove. 

So do we give it until after kindergarten? Push for an eval now? I'm really not sure. We brought it up at her last epileptologist appointment wondering if it could be connected to the surgery or not, since the tumor was <1mm away from the motor cortex responsible for face muscle movement, and he said it's a possibility, but that at her age, the medical providers wouldn't handle it, the schools would. 

[luvboston]

Push for an eval!

[mamaturtle]

Push for an eval now

[brachysira]

My son is 2.5 and has the same problems with his speech. He did not qualify for Early On and they said since he said all the sounds, he just needed to practice and there was nothing they could do. We found with my daughter that private places will take you pretty much for any reason you give, and she very much enjoyed doing some occupational therapy that was briefly covered by our insurance. As they age, I think articulation is seen as something they can work on, so yes, get an eval and therapy. We're going to move on this with my son soon.

[mrsbuttinski]

No way I would wait until after kindie for an eval.

Private SLPs do treat kids this age if you have insurance or pay OOP. School district/LEA cover speech if there is an educational need from age 3. A lot of people do both.

[k3am]

Now to figure out how to go about even getting a speech eval...

[mamaturtle]

Mar 22, 2017 15:34:08 GMT -5 k3am said:

Now to figure out how to go about even getting a speech eval...

If you go for private speech therapy, you will need a referral from your pediatrician.

If you go to the school district, you need to write a letter to the Special Ed Department at the school district and request an eval on all areas. Attach a green card when you mail it at the post office. Evaluation can take up to 60 days.

[k3am]

Amusingly enough, DH now thinks that she's not that far behind.

Our new neighbor is the coordinator for special ed in a neighboring school district (not ours), and said that unless she's in the bottom 1%, she won't qualify for services.

So now I'm wondering if we just wait until she starts Junior K this September and hear what her teachers have to say. I sat down with her and walked her through a lot of sounds, and the ones that she really struggles the most with l's, blends, and r's consistently, and f, g, and d, depending on where they fall in the word.

[mamaturtle]

k3am,
You need to follow your gut in what you think is best for your DD.

My DH was in denial that DS had delays and needed help. DH didn't even want to take DS to his therapies. I had to start all of the leg work on the therapies by myself when DS was a toddler.

I am glad I followed my gut despite DH's thoughts on DS's needs when DS was a toddler. If I waited for DH to come around, it would have been too late and DS would have been far behind.

[k3am]

mamaturtle, DH was actually the one who was pushing for it initially. He's been more stressed over her speech than I ever have been.

But I definitely understand where you're coming from - when we first started noticing DD's weird behavior, he chalked it up to her being a weird kid, and I was the one pushing for consultations. The severity and frequency of the seizures escalated, so they would have been noticed eventually, but we were at least 3-4 months ahead of where we'd have been if we'd waited for them to be obvious. And when she was unresponsive to medication, he was along the lines of give it more time, try another medication, and I was the one pushing for a new doctor, additional testing, ruling her in as surgical candidate, etc. (Everything I read said that if a patient doesn't respond to three medications, they're not likely to respond at all, and surgery is an option even without a tumor.) If I hadn't been pushing all along, who knows when we'd have found out about her tumor.

[mrsbuttinski]

k3am, your neighbor must work for a shitty district.

The percentage of kids receiving special education services in the U.S. varies between about 10% and 17% depending on the state- I have no idea how they all fit into the bottom 1%.

My kid got ESY and academic IEP support even with grade level academics.