Developing communication skills is one of the most important elements to socializing and creating valuable relationships. Speech-language pathologists help clients overcome barriers to communication and eating. Speech-language therapy consists of specialized interventions to allow the client to gain appropriate communication, language, articulation, feeding and oral motor planning skills.
A speech and language evaluation will clearly identify areas of weakness and provide an assessment of your child’s skill level and age-based competency. Speech therapy can then address these areas of weakness and close the gap, with the goal of advancing your child’s speech to the age-appropriate range. The CEPT Speech therapy team provides in-depth assessments and one-on-one intervention for all of our clients.
After doing an initial speech and language evaluation, the evaluating SLP will individualize your child’s treatment plan based on his/her specific needs. In addition, some of the specialized intervention programs we offer are described below. If appropriate, one or more of these programs may be recommended for your child.
Social Cognition
Social cognition skills can be taught and practiced through one of two options:
• Individual therapy sessions – the patient receives one-on-one intervention with a therapist and participates in groups activities
• Social groups – we offer social cognition groups throughout the year for a variety of ages – these groups offer an opportunity to learn and practice social cognition skills with peers
Our social cognition treatment often incorporates the Social Thinking® Methodology (www.socialthinking.com), which was created by Michelle Garcia-Winner. The Social Thinking Methodology is designed to teach social cognition skills and using one’s “social smarts” in order to facilitate problem solving and decision-making in social situations.
This program is not affiliated with, nor has it been reviewed, approved, or endorsed by Michelle Garcia Winner and Think Social Publishing, Inc.
PROMPT for Articulation
PROMPT© refers to Prompts for Restructuring Oral Muscular Phonetic Targets and is a tactile-kinesthetic approach to speech therapy, which means that the SLP uses touch cues on the patient’s face (i.e., throat, jaw, lips, tongue) to support and shape correct movement of the articulators for speech production.
DTTC for Childhood Apraxia of Speech
DTTC refers to Dynamic Temporal and Tactile Cueing and is a systematic approach for childhood apraxia of speech. Multi-sensory cueing (i.e., saying the word/phrase together, touch-based cues, gestural cues, visual modeling, verbal feedback) is provided in order to assist the child in improving the motor planning system. A highly motivating, individualized set of target words are selected and targeted through multiple repetitions and use of the DTTC cueing system.
SOS Approach to Feeding
The SOS (Sequential Oral Sensory) Approach to Feeding focuses on increasing a child’s comfort level by exploring and learning about the different properties of food. The program allows a child to interact with food in a playful, non-stressful way, beginning with the ability to tolerate the food in the room and in front of him/her, then moving on to managing the smell of the food, learning how food feels on the body and in one’s mouth, and then enjoying tasting and eating new foods following the 32 Steps to Eating.
Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulation for Feeding/Swallowing (VitalStim)
Neuromuscular electrical stimulation involves the administration of small, electrical impulses to the swallowing muscles in the throat through electrodes attached to the skin overlaying the musculature. Once the electrodes are placed and current intensity has been increased to a satisfactory level, the therapist begins traditional oral motor, feeding, and swallowing exercises with the patient. The VitalStim Therapy System is utilized to administer NMES. A specialty certified speech-language pathologist administers NMES. It is a non-invasive therapy.
Speech-language pathologists provide evaluation and treatment for:
- Receptive and expressive language delays
- Pragmatic language
- Social skills
- Auditory processing
- Autism and related disorders
- Pre-linguistic skills
- Paralinguistic
- Speech apraxia
- Articulation disorders
- Stuttering/fluency
- Tongue thrust
- Oral motor/feeding
- Augmentative and alternative communication
- Voice
- Cognition (attention, sequencing and problem solving)