This practice provides treatment for Communication Disorders, Language Disorders, and Speech Disorders. You may have heard all of those labels for the behavior.
The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) has provided a Relevant Paper which contains a concise breakdown of Communication Disorders. The definitions are broad and make distinctions between the disorders.
— Communication Disorders involve difficulty in the ability to receive, send, process, and comprehend concepts or verbal, nonverbal, and graphic symbol systems. A communication disorder may be evident in hearing, language, and/or speech, and may range in severity from mild to profound.
— Language Disorders are present when there is difficulty with comprehension and/or use of spoken, written, and/or other symbol systems. Language disorders may be broken into:
- the form of language (phonology which is sounds, morphology which is words, and syntax which is sentences)
- the content of language (semantics)
- the function of language in communication (pragmatics)
— Speech Disorders are present when there is struggle with articulation of speech sounds, fluency, and/or voice.
Once an initial assessment is complete, treatment is designed to optimize the individual’s ability to communicate The goal is to improve the quality of life. Treatment is developed and implemented to address the presenting concerns of the communication problem or related issue. The goal of treatment is to establish or strengthen a new skill or to remediate or restore an impaired skill. (rephrased from ASHA Scope of Practice)
Treatment of a Language or Communication Disorder might look like this and may include:
— Telling / drawing about events
— Describing a process / retelling process
— Hearing story / reading story / retelling story
— Playing game / describing how to play / retelling process
— Listening to passages / answering questions about passage
— Discussing social situations
— Sequencing pictures / retelling story in pictures
— Direct experience / describing experience
— Making craft / describing process
Treatment is offered for Speech Disorders which is an impairment of the articulation of speech sounds, fluency, and/or voice.
Working on a Speech Disorder of articulation may look like this and may include:
- Producing a target sound in isolation
- Producing a target sound in interactions
- Producing a target sound in rote items
- Producing a target sound in some spontaneous conversation
- Generalizing the use of the target sound to spontaneous conversation
