My 12yr old dd, still has trouble with her ‘r’s. Can anyone recommend some books she can read out loud at home to ‘practice’ ‘her ‘r’s. She can make the sounds correctly in isolation, but does not always practice in everyday speech. She’s reading Harry Potter books right now, but I’m thinking I need something that is a bit under her reading level and has alot of r sounds in it.
I also feel like she sounds like she talks underwater. Any ideas on what we can to do work on this area of speech? I was thinking music voice lessons might teach her how to speak from her diaphram? vs. her nose. I wish now I would have encouraged her to join the choir at school or church.
Any thoughts?
P.S. She has been to private SLP in past and currently has speech as part of her IEP.
HI,
I am an SLP. This is a link to a great little website to practice articulation at home and at school. http://www.quia.com/pages/havemorefun.html
It sounds like she has some nasality in her speech, have you had her tonsils and adenoids looked at recently? Also she could have chronic nasal congestion from allergies or a slight hearing loss that is causing some of the nasality you are hearing in her speech. You can also get other products from SuperDuper to practice ‘r’ in her speech. But I think the website will give you a lot of practice ideas.
Also look up r words in a rhyming dictionary and just make up funny little sentences…Here is one off the top of my head..
There was a teacher with thirty three thirsty and dirty little birds in a fairly enormous and even bigger cage in a pretty pearly little room……etc…. you get the idea…you are making up tongue twisters more or less. Have her say them slowly and then faster and faster while improving her articulation of ‘r’.