What is Speech and Language Therapy?

Language and speech disorders which are seen at a significant rate in children represent a problematic area, seriously affecting their social relations, academic success, and emotional development. For this reason, addressing these problems at an early age will have a positive impact on the child's life quality.

In which cases is a language and speech disorder noticed?

• Inability to start talking despite reaching a certain age
• Delayed development compared with peers
• Trying to communicate with signs or single words
• Inability to make sentences
• Stammering
• Not saying some of the speech sounds
• A voice tone lower or different than what is normal
• Speaking fast at such degree so as to prevent being understood
• Swallowing sounds and/or syllables

In which areas does Language and Speech Therapy provide services?

• Stammering
• Speech delay
• Language disorders
• Articulation and phonological disorders
• Developmental disorders common to the group eligible to receive speech therapy
• Early language and speech therapy for children with special needs and developmental disabilities
• Speech and language therapy in children with hearing loss
• Cleft palate and lip
• Specific language impairment
• Apraxia (failure to develop necessary motor ability to produce words and voluntary muscle movements in relation to speech programming)

The most common language and speech disorders of the childhood

Fluency disorders – stammering

Stammering is a problem affecting fluency of speech generally starting at 2-5 years of age. It may occur in different forms during speech such as repetition of syllables, blocks, sound prolongations and additions. This disorder is reported 4 times in boys than in girls. It is possible to control stammering to a certain extent using therapy, however, this requires a regular therapy process.

Articulation and phonological disorders

This disorder is characterized by difficulty in pronouncing sounds or use of another sound instead of that sound. For example; inability to produce sounds like /r/, /s/, /k/ or substituting them with other sounds, such as /RABBIT/- /WABBIT. In this case, faulty sound(s) are identified through tests, and after they are evaluated in oral-motor terms, a therapy plan is prepared.

Speech delay– Language delay

When a child is one year old, he/she is expected to speak single words, and to have a vocabulary of minimum 50 words at 1.5 - 2 years, and to make sentences consisting of 2-3 words at about 2.5 years. It is possible that children with a different speech development are classified in the group we call “late talking normal children” Sometimes, however, a speech delay may be the first sign of a serious problem in a child. In such cases, early intervention significantly increases the possibility to get a response.

Who is a Language and Speech Therapist?

A language and speech therapist is a health professional who has an undergraduate or associate degree in language and speech therapy, or a masters or doctorate degree in language and speech therapy after other undergraduate studies, and carries out studies to prevent sound, speech and language disorders of individuals, and deals with the rehabilitation of swallowing, language and speech disorders diagnosed by a medical doctor.