My kid has had speech therapy starting at 3 for articulation. Initially he was 1-1, but when he got older, there was another kid. He's now starting K and has about. 6 months left on his IEP. I suspect he won't continue to qualify after that expires and I don't think we'll send him private since he's generally sounding pretty normal now.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

That was not our experience. My kid had no real academic impact from his lisp/r sounding like w - he was confident and an incredible speller for example. But he got one on one help from kinder to second grade and one on two from second to fourth, when he graduated.

We did supplement with twice a week private therapy as well in kinder and first. Mostly because we weren’t great at practicing on our own (ADHD house).

Sometimes you get really lucky with the SLP assigned and they have room on their caseload but that is far from the norm. Even my child with apraxia didn’t get 1:1 or 1:2.

Agree - at our school they deny services even with an outside eval. They have to believe it has an impact in school, and they are very quick to say it doesn’t.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

That was not our experience. My kid had no real academic impact from his lisp/r sounding like w - he was confident and an incredible speller for example. But he got one on one help from kinder to second grade and one on two from second to fourth, when he graduated.

We did supplement with twice a week private therapy as well in kinder and first. Mostly because we weren’t great at practicing on our own (ADHD house).

Sometimes you get really lucky with the SLP assigned and they have room on their caseload but that is far from the norm. Even my child with apraxia didn’t get 1:1 or 1:2.

I am surprised to learn kids get 1:1 speech therapy. My child who is autistic gets two 30-minutes a week group session. There was already talk about cutting it to just once a week. He is verbal but has significant communication issue and not once did anyone bring up 1:1. We were basically told to be grateful that we have in-person speech.

Your kids should get 1-1 a few times a week.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

That was not our experience. My kid had no real academic impact from his lisp/r sounding like w - he was confident and an incredible speller for example. But he got one on one help from kinder to second grade and one on two from second to fourth, when he graduated.

We did supplement with twice a week private therapy as well in kinder and first. Mostly because we weren’t great at practicing on our own (ADHD house).

Sometimes you get really lucky with the SLP assigned and they have room on their caseload but that is far from the norm. Even my child with apraxia didn’t get 1:1 or 1:2.

I am surprised to learn kids get 1:1 speech therapy. My child who is autistic gets two 30-minutes a week group session. There was already talk about cutting it to just once a week. He is verbal but has significant communication issue and not once did anyone bring up 1:1. We were basically told to be grateful that we have in-person speech.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

That was not our experience. My kid had no real academic impact from his lisp/r sounding like w - he was confident and an incredible speller for example. But he got one on one help from kinder to second grade and one on two from second to fourth, when he graduated.

We did supplement with twice a week private therapy as well in kinder and first. Mostly because we weren’t great at practicing on our own (ADHD house).

Sometimes you get really lucky with the SLP assigned and they have room on their caseload but that is far from the norm. Even my child with apraxia didn’t get 1:1 or 1:2.

I wouldn't expect a child to get speech therapy with a lisp, but for your child or mine, where there is a huge impact, they deserve much better.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

That was not our experience. My kid had no real academic impact from his lisp/r sounding like w - he was confident and an incredible speller for example. But he got one on one help from kinder to second grade and one on two from second to fourth, when he graduated.

We did supplement with twice a week private therapy as well in kinder and first. Mostly because we weren’t great at practicing on our own (ADHD house).

Sometimes you get really lucky with the SLP assigned and they have room on their caseload but that is far from the norm. Even my child with apraxia didn’t get 1:1 or 1:2.

Anonymous wrote:Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

That was not our experience. My kid had no real academic impact from his lisp/r sounding like w - he was confident and an incredible speller for example. But he got one on one help from kinder to second grade and one on two from second to fourth, when he graduated.

We did supplement with twice a week private therapy as well in kinder and first. Mostly because we weren’t great at practicing on our own (ADHD house).

We were told that because of the shortage of SLPs that children would get speech therapy over Zoom

Our school likes to say they are doing an eval and they have the speech therapist meet with the kid and then give parents tips for how to help at home — so make clear, OP, that you want a Child Find meeting and are requesting an IEP.

It will depend on the school. Our school did an IEP but it was 30 minutes of group speech therapy with 8 kids with unrelated needs. It was not helpful. Other kids get 1-1. We had to do it outside MCPS.

Only if the speech difficulties impact them in the classroom -- the teacher can't understand them, kids make fun of them, etc. If it's just articulation, it has to be pretty bad to qualify for an IEP.

If you have $$ get an outside diagnosis and evaluation.

You need to request services in writing. You can ask your child’s teacher for the name of the specific contact at your school. The process to obtain services can take many many months so it’s best to start right away. In my experience (3 kids who needed speech services), it can be difficult to qualify. I requested services for DD in early K and we were continually turned down and told she wasn’t behind enough. She finally was approved in 2nd grade. Fortunately, my older son qualified on first eval in K for phonological disorder and my youngest with apraxia came into K with an IEP so there wasn’t such a delay. Still the services provided were in a group setting once a week so we had to supplement.

Do a formal request for an evaluation from your teacher and the speech therapist at your school. Cc vice principal. They will do some testing and determine if you qualify for services and then they will do the pullout time for your kid. It's usually not enough but something. They have a lot of kids to take care of and not enough resources to go around. Some private therapists will come to school as well. My kid needed help (expressive only and not articulating). She just couldn't get all her thoughts out legibly and got stuck. We did it qualify for services in school but did private once a week at home for 4 months and it was worth every penny and she's much better now.

Do elementary schools provide speech therapy to the kids with speech difficulties? How does it work? How to apply for it? Thanks.