Stuttering Therapy: Making Friends with Speech Man

Sometimes stuttering just happens. You often hear that phrase in the stuttering community. One parent recently described a “puzzled look” that passes over her young daughter’s face when she stutters. Stuttering seems to happen out of nowhere.

For many reasons, including demystifying stuttering, speech therapy encourages people who stutter to become “experts in their own talking” as one of my teachers puts it. Speech therapists working with school-aged children use non-scary anatomical drawings and fun activities to teach a child about the speech mechanism, including:

• respiration

• phonation

• articulation

A child who is experiencing a “silent block” is unable to produce a sound. Mouth open, body straining, he or she seems to hang in the space between thought and speech. Learning that the vocal folds produce sound (phonation) with the help of air from the lungs (respiration) can empower the child and reduce feelings of helplessness. The child can begin to learn and apply strategies to deal with silent blocks. Knowledge is power.

A child who stutters on words beginning with /p/ might be experiencing tension in the lips. Learning that /p/ is produced with the lips can help that child get a handle on what is happening so he or she can learn to control it with a speech strategy. Knowledge is power.

I’ve used crafting with macaroni shapes, cut and paste activities, worksheets, and coloring activities to build models that help teach the anatomy and physiology of the speech mechanism. I also ask children to explain the process of respiration, phonation, and articulation to me, and to family members.

One of my typical fluency therapy goals is: “Will explain and model the process of respiration, articulation, and phonation with three or fewer cues, to two or more people, over five sessions.”