Brooklyn Speech Therapy PLLC

Charlie the cat is the unofficial BK Speech mascot 🙌 A walk to go pet Charlie has been an exiting reward for hard work and kind listening in speech class. Least excited of all about this is actually Charlie himself 🙀 (he gets treats he’s fine)

If you want to have more meaningful conversations after school, try out some of our chat tips 👇

👭Get specific: ask about your child’s friends, their favorite activity, or an item they brought home in their backpack. Think *who, where, why* questions.

📸Incorporate visuals- sometimes schools will share photos with parents from each day. Make a routine of looking at them together before bed for conversation inspo.

🤹‍♂️Design a conversation game that the whole family plays. For instance, everyone share a highlight and lowlight from their day, or asks another person a “would you rather” scenario specific to their routine.

🙆‍♀️When in doubt: demonstrate. If your child is particularly shy, quiet, or is struggling with some communication delays. Talk to them about *your* day in a way that they could relate to. For instance “I was so happy to see ____ at the office today” or “My morning meeting was way too long and boring”

Have concerns about your child’s communication skills? Send us a DM to schedule a complimentary phone consult!

If your child is in any kind of developmental therapy and it looks like they’re just playing, then you have a *great* therapist. For us clinicians, traditional therapy approaches are easy to carry-out, but boring for kids. ☝️Mix in a little creativity to disguise therapy as games… et voilà : Lots of happy little learners ✨

Candy, spider webs, mummies & zombies! Halloween speech games have us ticking those speech goals off the list 🤩 These hard working kids have been mastering sounds, practicing tricky pronouns & getting inspo for longer sentences from the neighborhood spookies. Happy Halloween!

"R" the letter says /r/, but of course it is not that simple because /r/ is very much influenced by the vowels and consonants around it. To make matters trickier for developing mouths, our tongues have to twist, tense and suspend themselves far back toward the throat to make this sound accurately. This is why we have a variety of victory dance moves for R success in therapy 💃🕺👯‍♀️

We're going to the Carroll Park Fair tomorrow with bubble makers, a rainbow filled with candy, our best sun hat and of course: some *speech therapy expertise* to share...see you there! 🌈☀️🍬👒

Brooklyn Speech Therapy PLLC updated their business hours.

The world of speech-language research and therapy is chock full of interesting little tidbits...interesting at least to us! Follow along with our "Did you know..." series this fall and keep your eye out for more around the neighborhood 💁‍♀️

Brooklyn Speech Therapy PLLC updated their phone number.

My hands may forever be stained green but...worth it👌
Shaving cream + Food Coloring + Water has been a winning combo lately at Brooklyn Speech Therapy PLLC. The sensory and visual engagement of these activities brought us longer attention spans for speech sound repetition trials, vocabulary inspo for early language growth and a motivator to drill practice tricky sight words 👏

It is time to start listening for first words! Only a few to kick off this exciting period, but those few are typically important things to your little one, including people they love. *Pro-tip* to avoid hurt feelings: "Dada" often comes before "mama" because the /d/ phoneme is easier to produce 😉 ...but sometimes its a favorite character like Elmo that just comes before everyone 🤷‍♀️

Recently re-published in the NYT, this article reveals some brain science behind meltdowns in toddlerhood (prefrontal cortex! mirror neurons!). It also offers up a few concrete response steps for caregivers. While tantrums are a part of the typical toddler experience, they can be significantly heightened by frustration from communication delays. Schedule a complimentary chat with a therapist to learn more about the ways in which speech delays impact behavior and emotion. email: [email protected]

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/15/parenting/kids-tantrums-advice.html

The Science Behind Your Child’s Tantrums And how to nip them in the bud before they start.

This is a great resource for parents who may be feeling overwhelmed at the idea of making up for lost COVID learning time. While some children do need a little extra support, for the most part they're like us and just need to take a break, a breather and to have some fun! Follow the link for a helpful .pdf 🤓

via The American Speech-Language Hearing Association

https://twitter.com/ASHAWeb/status/1395800316650655744?s=20

ASHA on Twitter “Want to boost your child’s language, literacy and learning skills over the summer? You generally don’t need to purchase formal workbooks, apps, or other “educational” programs. Everyday life is full of opportunities! https://t.co/g58McVdTXm”

We've been busy returning to speech therapy IRL and we're all loving it. Decorate a bush with your vocabulary cards to build two word phrases? Sure! Have an S articulation matching tournament with your tea party guests?? WHY not?! And my personal favorite: illustrating (and retelling) new versions of your favorite story book series- YES.

Think of 9-12 months as an opening act for the
⭐️ First Words Main Event ⭐️ . As little ones are gearing up in this stage to produce their first words they are fine tuning their sound repertoire in babble, honing their attention in more closely to speech and beginning to follow very simple instructions. At this stage it is important to recognize behavior and actions as a means of communicating. Gestures like reaching to be picked up or knocking a toy away out of frustration is your little one trying to tell you "up!" or "all done". Over the next 6 months, these gestures should be replaced with their first words so keep an eye out and provide speech models for these actions!

The 6-9 month age span is when we start to see the communication 💡 come on in a more recognizable way. Babble and basic nonverbal communication begin and baby is more aware of themselves and their family members. Now is the time when these little cuties start to find delight in actions producing reactions-- the foundation of communication (I say 'baba' and everyone smiles and says 'baba' too?! 🤯 ). Play fosters these cognitive skills, think: peek-a-boo, pop-up toys and little instruments!

At 3-6 months we start to see baby increase their attention span, play around with those vocal cords and have their first conversations with an exchange of coos. These are important building blocks for speech and interaction so keep an eye out! For a boost: babble away with them, imitate their sounds, make silly mouth movements and provide a lot of sensory stimulation to lips and cheeks :)

Communication isn't just speech...and communication development starts from the jump! A lot goes on behind the scenes for kids before they become full fledged chatterboxes at 3 years old. In a series of posts I will be sharing some of these subtle speech, language and cognitive milestones to look out for...because the earlier we catch delays and address them, the less impact they have on your child's ability to *SHINE*

Kicking it off with 0-3 months: Baby, meet World!

A contextualizing & comforting read for moms who are feeling like they're dropping all of the balls they're juggling (WHO can juggle this many balls? No one!)
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/24/opinion/covid-pandemic-mothers-parenting.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

Opinion | Mothers All Over Are Losing It Pandemic life has made us feel more insecure about the aspects of our parenting we were already most insecure about.

Slow is clear speech! Sometimes a simple visual cue is all your child needs to remember this simple strategy. This speech road sign is one we use in virtual therapy. Visual cues at home can also be reminder bracelets, a temporary tattoo or my personal favorite: writing your child's target sound on post-it notes and sticking them up around the house (they choose the spots!).

Introducing Brooklyn Speech Therapy's page! A place for parents to learn about the ins and outs of their child's communication development and gain peace of mind through evidence based information (rather than doom googling 👀).
A chat with our founder Taylor D'Aries M.S. CCC-SLP is just an email: [email protected], phone call: 929-276-2861 or DM away!