My son’s speech therapist wants him to start the Fast Forward program this summer because of his slow speech and poor ability to think on his feet. I have concerns because of its cost and because my son has good phonemic awareness. After reading the boards, I decided that I would get him a CAPD eval to see if he was a good candidate for Fast Forward. Unfortunately, I just found out, the recommended audioligists in my state don’t do evals for kids under 8; mine’s 6 and a half. Do you think that means I should wait until he’s 8 to consider Fast Forward? Thanks.
Re: CAPD & Fast Forward
You might try a different audiologist. My son was 7 and I have heard children as young as five being tentatively diagnosed. The thinking is that there is a developmental component and until kids are to a certain age it is hard to tell what is really problematic. In other words, young children have such a wide range of ability, that is it harder to define what is abnormal. Children who are severe still can be identified at a young age. My son’s audiologist told me that kids develop until they are 13 and then what they have, is what they get.
Also, I would look under auditory processing in LD in depth. There are several articles on what to look for in CAPD. That will give you a pretty good idea. In our case, the audiologist just confirmed what I pretty much already knew. We did FFW after first grade—it would have been better to have done it a year earlier. Most of first grade just went right by him. So if you think he fits the profile, I would do it. You also could talk to FFW folks. The video I got when I cross trained had my son all over it.
Beth
Beth
Re: CAPD & Fast Forward
My son will be 5 in July and has been in speech therapy since he just turned 3 and they were convinced he had processing issues but said he could not be tested until he was 7. In my research of CAPD I found that they do research on CAPD at Colorado State Universiy at the Engineering Research Center in Fort collins,Colorado. They told me that testing can be done for this as young as 3. I called them up and had them send me information on their research.
Then I called every major hospital (children’s in particular) and spoke directly to the heads of their Audiology Departments and was told by all of them that they would not be comfortable testing at this age but did All refer me to an audiologist in Chicago area that has PHD in Audiology and specializes in this type of testing and they often confer with her if they are unsure.
She tested my son when he just turned 4 and found him to be developing normally. It was a very thorough report as acknoledged by the school district.She did make reccomendations of activities that stimulate auditory skills and periodic audiologic follow ups. We got our insurance to cover this testing.
He continues to progress rapidly with his speech issues. If he did not we would have him tested again at age 7. Sorry this is so long . Thought the info might help. Don’t wait if possible.The earlier the better and maybe you can find out exactly what your son needs.
Cathy
I wouldn’t wait, but I tend to be very aggressive in addressing LD’s.
What I would recommend (actually, this is what I did) is buy the company’s self-training tutorial package, called CrossTrain, and train yourself to be your son’s provider. Once you are a certified provider (it’s fairly easy) you can order FFW. The company usually puts FFW on sale towards the end of the year. Regular price is $850. In 1999 the company discounted it to $650 for the month of December. In 2000 they discounted it to $650 for two weeks in October, $750 in November, and $800 in December.
Theoretically, you could do FFW at home for a total investment of $750. As therapies go, this is a reasonable price.
Assuming you already have a computer at home, your only additional costs might be for a high quality soundboard with sound jacks, and a set of high quality earphones.
FFW has a variety of impacts. Some children with expressive language delays seem to benefit greatly, and as has been mentioned elsewhere it tends to be helpful for developing short-term auditory memory.
Although I tend to recommend a CAPD eval first, the truth is that many audiologists won’t actually recommend FFW because of the lack of independent research validating its usefulness. The major benefit of a CAPD eval is finding out the full range and extent of any auditory processing problems. There are subtypes of CAPD that respond better to specific academic accommodations.
Mary