“I once promised myself that I would teach my hearing-impaired son to speak, send him to a regular school and tell journalists about our successes. Speech therapist: How to teach a child to speak and when to start worrying Features of oral speech for the deaf and hard of hearing

Andrei was not even a year old when, saving him from intestinal obstruction, doctors administered him an antibiotic. The boy survived, but a side effect of the drug was deafness...

The story with Andrey happened more than twenty years ago. As painful as it may be, children still often go deaf from antibiotics. Despite the fact that the detrimental effect of many of them on the hearing organs is known, antibiotics continue to be prescribed in the treatment of pneumonia, bronchitis, and intestinal diseases. More often - in the provinces, where doctors have no choice of medications, and sometimes simply lack knowledge.

For example, there was such a case. Two-year-old Tanya was taken away by ambulance in critical condition. The baby was choking, temperature up to 40 degrees, coughing with blood...

After my daughter was injected with gentamicin, she became restless and hid her head under the pillow,” says the mother. “My husband arrived and started asking her something. Tanyusha looked at him in surprise and shook her head... We immediately sounded the alarm - the child couldn’t hear! After examining the girl, doctors announced that she had become deaf from antibiotics. The most that can be done is to choose a high-quality hearing aid.

It may be impossible to restore hearing after viral infections - influenza, mumps, rubella measles. But this does not mean that the child has only one thing left to do - learn sign language. Thanks to the dedication of his parents and their devotion, Andrei Chernyshov, who celebrated his 20th birthday, learned to speak, graduated from public school and now works as an assistant accountant. We hope that his story of finding speech will help Tanya’s parents and others who suffered this misfortune not to lose heart and look to the future with more confidence.

Your son is deaf

Andryusha! - a 20-year-old mother called out to her one-and-a-half-year-old baby several times. But the son, who was fiddling with his toys, did not react. Only when Lena touched his hand did he look up at her. “Are you playing too much?..” she wondered with vague anxiety, not knowing that her first-born son could not hear at all. When Lena later found out every now and then that Andryushin’s peers were already chirping with all their might, while her baby was only babbling incoherently, the anxiety intensified. Doctors and friends reassured me: they say, if he gets talking, boys generally start talking later.

Lena and her husband finally decided to show Andryusha to specialists. The results of the audiometric examination were depressing: the baby could not hear. It was useless to operate, and without a hearing aid he could only hear a scream right next to his ear. “What were you sick with? Is there any heredity? Didn’t they inject him with antibiotics?” - the doctors asked. Lena remembered that, saving Andryusha from a volvulus, he was given an antibiotic. Then she learned that about 40% of children who lost their hearing became deaf from antibiotics...

It was so hard that I thought I wouldn’t leave the hospital,” continues Elena Ivanovna, now a teacher of the deaf at the Research Institute of Otolaryngology named after. prof. A. I. Kolomiychenko. - I ask: where should I go with him now? “They reassured me”: “Why are you crying, getting upset - we have many special educational institutions where the deaf live and study. They have their own world there, their own environment...”

“Your own world...” These words made it even more painful. It seemed as if some invisible force wanted to take the child away from her. “How can we send him to a boarding school, tear him away from his family?” - Lena and her husband Konstantin were in despair.

Andryushin’s dad is a military man, courageous and always reserved,” continues Elena Ivanovna. “I cried, and he went through everything in silence, but when we returned home, he couldn’t stand it: he lay down and cried. The thought that his son would never hear the voices of his loved ones was unbearable. Having gathered my strength, three days later I went to the Institute of Otolaryngology to see the teacher of the deaf, Lyubov Sidorenko. She worked in the same office where we are talking (I didn’t imagine then that over time I, an engineer-economist, would graduate from the defectology department and would see patients here myself!). I remembered her encouraging words for the rest of my life: “Andryusha needs to learn to speak. And he won’t have to be sent to any boarding school - he will study at a regular public school.” It was hard for me to believe that you could talk without hearing your own voice. “Go to Moscow and you’ll see for yourself,” insisted Lyubov Alexandrovna.

First words

In Moscow, I was accepted by a family in which a deaf girl grew up. She was talking! Of course, her speech was monotonous, but she could be understood without difficulty. It was a miracle. I looked at her audiogram - everything was like Andryusha’s!

Deaf children babble just like hearing children, says Elena Ivanovna. - But for those who hear babbling, “ma-ma-ma-ma”, “pa-pa-pa” gradually transforms into “mom” and “dad”. In the deaf, babbling speech does not develop.

The training began with babbling. Elena Ivanovna took the microphone in her hands, Andryusha was put on headphones and taught to follow the lips of the speaker. He said “ma-ma-ma” - they stopped him: here’s “mom”! And at the same time they showed how to spell this word, drew a picture or showed a photograph. They taught what the difference is between the sound of “mma-ma” when the cheek vibrates, and “ppa-pa” when there is a push of air. Every word had to be suffered through. But when it worked out, it was a holiday. The number of words and phrases increased every day. “Milk”, “train”, “light”, “open the door” - my mother taught, and Andryusha repeated them over and over until he could not pronounce them.

Just like everyone else

The efforts of the Chernyshov family, spent on teaching their son to speak, were rewarded. On September 1, with a bouquet of flowers, Andryusha went to the same school from which his mother had graduated.

They allowed me to choose a teacher for him myself. Natalya Prokofievna was even younger than me. She seemed like a kind person to me - and I was not mistaken.

Andryusha was seated at the first desk next to the girl. Natalya Prokofyevna explained to the children that a hearing aid would help their classmate hear the outline of a word more clearly and understand speech from the lips.

The first days I was literally on duty outside the classroom doors, even looking through the crack to see how he was doing, because he couldn’t hear! - Elena Ivanovna admits. “And although my son was well prepared for school, I was terribly worried.

“Elena Ivanovna, and your Andryusha is over there!” The children at school greeted her warmly, and my mother’s soul brightened. When the Chernyshov family had to move to another area, they did not change schools, although it was a bit far to get there.

Studying was not easy for Andrey, especially in high school, when many disciplines appeared. But the support of parents, teachers and schoolmates helped to overcome difficulties. And how could one not support an open, smiling, gentle-mannered guy who did not submit to fate and who was not broken by difficulties?..

After school, I entered the Industrial and Economic College, and this year I graduated from it,” Andrey said over a cup of coffee.

Now I work as an assistant accountant in a company.

When I told the company employees that Andrey couldn’t hear, they were at first confused. But, having met him, they said: don’t worry, he will master the wisdom of accounting,” his mother recalls. “I consider this a great success, because now it is difficult even for a hearing person to get a job.

What do you do in your free time? - I ask Andrey.

I walk the dog, read, meet friends.

In the summer?

I like to travel and swim in the sea. This year I vacationed in Odessa with a group...

In parting, Elena Ivanovna said: “Of course, it would be much easier for my son to learn sign language, but we really wanted him to be the same as all the children. I had to be patient, but in general, this is hellish work.”

A talking deaf person is a feat of parents

The future of a deaf child is ninety percent the work of mom and dad,” says Elizaveta Pushkarskaya, chairman of the Kyiv Association of Parents and Children with Hearing Impairments. - And what kind of teachers, psychologists and just people they turn out to be - kind or not - depends on what kind of personality they will grow up to be. It's hard work. After all, in order to teach such a child to talk, parents must devote themselves completely to him.

Unfortunately, not everyone succeeds. They told me about a mother with a pedagogical education who could not cope with her classes and help her child. And the other - without education, but simply a talented woman - successfully did it. The problem for many is that all their time is spent on getting their daily bread, and there is no time to take care of the child.

What comes naturally to hearing people often presents enormous difficulties to deaf people. For example, it is very important to develop imaginative thinking and a sense of humor in these children - they take everything very seriously. Non-speaking deaf children have difficulties with spatial-temporal thinking - it is difficult for them to comprehend that, for example, Shakespeare and Dostoevsky lived at different times. Deaf, but with speech, these things are understandable. Children who are still deaf are extremely vulnerable. To help them gain self-confidence and not offend, some mothers show extraordinary ingenuity. One of them, for example, came up with a certain mythical Marina and described all her daughter’s bad deeds on it: “Marina walked, unwrapped the candy, and threw the piece of paper at her feet - how bad that is!..”

According to Elizaveta Nikolaevna, there are about a hundred rehabilitated children in Kyiv. Some are already behind universities and technical schools. Others have yet to go to a mainstream school, which will give them the opportunity to communicate more with hearing people and receive a more complete education - in special schools the volume of knowledge is different. This also provides a clearer prospect for continuing studies. But for a mass school, a child must be better prepared than other peers - having felt that he knows more than hearing people, he will be able to be active in lessons and study more successfully.

The head of the children's department of the Research Institute of Otolaryngology, Larisa Kobzaruk, spoke about the reasons leading to deafness:

Deafness can develop gradually over several years or months, or it can occur suddenly. Either one or both ears are affected. The cause is a viral infection (the child’s hearing can be damaged from it even before birth if the mother was ill during pregnancy), aminoglycoside antibiotics (streptomycin, gentamicin, polymycin, kanomycin, monomycin), as well as trauma during childbirth. Sometimes deafness is hereditary.

What determines the effectiveness of treatment?

Depending on how soon it was started and the degree of hearing damage. If treatment is started within a month from the onset of the disease, then the probability of cure reaches 90-100%. But, unfortunately, in most cases, parents do not immediately notice deafness, and doctors diagnose it late, especially in the youngest. Parents should be wary if their child has to repeat the same thing several times, if he turns on the TV or radio louder than he should, or if he learns to speak later and slower than his peers.

Natalya MATVEEVA

“How did you teach Grisha to read?” - the defectologist who works with my hearing-impaired son asked me after the lesson. The teacher is young and she is interested in everything. I know this is not a rhetorical question. Grisha is restless, often distracted, and gets tired quickly. Doctors diagnose him with ADHD - hyperactivity disorder. Classes have to be structured in cycles: study for 20 minutes, take a 5-minute break, then continue studying again. That is why he is studying according to an individual program, and not in a class. Hearing her question makes me think. I often observed in my surroundings that children did not want to read. Parents complain that they are only interested in the computer. I will share my discoveries on the topic of teaching reading.

1. Create a fabulous atmosphere. Reading is not a duty, not a punishment, not an order “I said, read!” Reading is a discovery, a shared journey, new resources. As soon as parents begin to force, force the child to read as punishment, that’s it - you discourage the process of learning.
What to do if you realize a mistake? Correct. And fix it together. It is important to find a topic that is interesting to the child. And go to the library or bookstore together and find books on your favorite topic.

My son likes robots and SpongeBob. I'm making a compromise. I'm not a fan of these characters, but I allow them to borrow the magazines from the library. And I myself choose books that might be interesting to him. At home I read aloud to him. Then we change roles. I say that I’m tired and want my son to read to me. Grishka is reading.
I tried to correct him less in the first moments, so as not to discourage him from reading aloud. I don't find fault with pronunciation. But I pay attention to intonation and periods at the end of sentences, question marks and exclamation marks.

Previously, I chose books with bright pictures, plot images and good large font. To be honest, I had to review a fair amount of children's books. I selected the best.

2. Decide on a methodology. The teacher of the deaf used the global reading technique. But I saw that Grishka did not perceive her. He was often distracted and did not remember a whole word. I had to go to the Internet. And I found information about the Nikitins’ method. Soon I ordered a set of cubes and tables from the online store, and our days of mastering reading began. Fortunately, my mother took an active part in this process. For which I thank her so much! Grishka quickly mastered the new technique. True, at first he pronounced the letters in a syllable separately. I had to use a trick - I drew two letters holding hands and said “SA”. She commented like this: “First the letters go to visit each other, get to know each other, and then they become friends, so we say not “C”, “A”, but “SA”.

When to start reading? I admit, I'm not a fan of early development. Grishka began reading on his own at the age of 6. Before that, he knew individual letters, but I didn’t terrorize him with reading, I didn’t chase standards. And read adaptive homemade books. We could sculpt, glue, cut, draw, craft, and use various homemade products. Some people already start reading at almost 4. But I didn’t compare Grisha’s level with the neighbor’s children.

3. Select texts based on your level of vocabulary proficiency. We had a period when I could not find books for my son according to his level of knowledge of words. Little did he know. Therefore, the first books were adaptive. I took notebooks and pasted on plot pictures from a children's book (the simplest one was 4-6 pages long). And below I wrote sentences of 3-5 words from Grisha’s dictionary + a couple of new ones.

5. Enroll your child in the library and buy books together. I really love bookstores. I can leave all the cash I have in my pocket there. We often buy books together. Grishka is a curious buyer and asks a lot of questions.
When I first brought my son to the library, he ran to the stacks shouting, “Mom, look, this is amazing!” The librarians were delighted with his reactions to the books; he could sit right between the shelves and read right away.

6. Read for yourself. Children perceive not what we say, but what we do. If we ask them to read, but we ourselves haven’t held a book in our hands for many years, where will the children get the desire? When my son saw me with a book, he might ask what I was reading about. She always answered his question.

7. Be interested in books by modern children's authors. Once upon a time I came across a book by one author (Oles Ilchenko), it was presented just for hearing-impaired children: large plot pictures and 2-3 sentences of text at the bottom. Later I met him through Facebook and thanked him for the interesting stories and design that suited my hearing-impaired son so well. The author admitted to me that he is also hard of hearing, wears a hearing aid in one ear, and wished Grishka creative fulfillment. I was shocked by yet another example of how a hard of hearing person can achieve success. Another stereotype was erased from my imagination.

If you have useful experiences in teaching reading or discoveries on this topic, share information in the comments!
And don’t let reading be a torment for your child!

Azova Olga Ivanovna
Photo: vesti.ru

Normal or not?

– Olga Ivanovna, tell us about speech norms. To what extent can you trust the tables: “A child should know so much and so much and say this and that per year”?

– A child should speak 1-10 words per year and know 30-60 words in the passive. This is information from the Children's Speech Data Fund of the Russian State Pedagogical University named after. A.I. Herzen, you can trust them. But I understand why this question arises. Once, while talking with a prominent scientist, neurologist, Doctor of Science, I heard: “We need to reconsider the norms of speech development.” And, although many years have passed, I never cease to be upset about this. How can they be revised? Apparently, to artificially shift the frames. But if black birches grow in Chernobyl after the disaster, this does not mean that this is the norm, everyone knows the white, silver birch. So it is with speech ontogenesis. It is easier to think not about the causes of speech delay, but about the falsification of normotypical development. After all, even if many children’s development is delayed, this does not mean that there is no norm.

St. Petersburg scientist V.A. Kovshikov, who dealt with speech disorders in children with alalia (lack of speech with intact hearing and intelligence), over the years conducted research on speech development in children of students of the Department of Speech Therapy of Leningrad State Pedagogical Institute named after. Herzen. In the 70s, all children met the speech norm; in the 80s and 90s, not all children did, and the percentage of normal speech development decreased every year.

– And if the child does not correspond to them, that’s cause for concern?

- Yes, this is a cause for concern. But I recommend paying attention not so much to the active vocabulary, but to whether the child understands the spoken speech and responds to simple speech instructions. For example, “bring a bottle” - goes to where the bottle usually stands, “let’s go wash our hands” - goes to the bathroom, imitates washing hands. At one year of age, a child should know his name and easily communicate and interact with parents and children on the playground.

– Does it happen that a child is silent until he is three years old, and then how does he start talking?

- Yes, it happens. These are hoarding children: they understand everything, communicate with gestures, but speak little. Still, I think they are not completely silent, they say a few words. There is such a hypothesis: modern children are “too smart” - they understand that they cannot do it the way adults do, and accumulate a passive vocabulary. But, in any case, this is a reason to contact a speech therapist. Although each history of speech development must be considered individually, each child has his own pace of development, but ontogenesis is the same for all.

Let's say that a child began to speak after three years, this does not mean that there will be no losses. In other words, if everything had been on time, the child’s level of development would have been higher. Such children usually have delays in speech and, possibly, psycho-speech development. And if speech begins to develop as if suddenly and intensely, then such rapidity is often accompanied by stuttering.

When to sound the alarm and should you take medications?

– What should really bother you? Can you tell us about the signs and reasons for concern in a year, one and a half, two, three, four - progressively with a table diagram? That is, what skills can a healthy child have?

– You can note the so-called “reference points”:

• 3-6 months - the child tries out the articulatory apparatus in action and makes many sounds.
• 1 year – the first words “mother”, “give”, with a good rate of development up to ten words.
• 2 years – constructing a simple phrase of 3-4 words.
• 3 years - a common phrase, the child speaks a lot and well, reads poetry by heart.
• 4 years – the phrase is constructed taking into account grammar, using all parts of speech.
• 4-5 years – speech takes the form of a short story. The beginning of the formation of phonemic hearing.
• 5 years – speech is formed, we can say that this is the speech of an adult. The child pronounces all sounds.
• 6 years – well-developed coherent speech.

By the beginning of school, a child’s speech is normally fully formed and developed so much that it moves to the level of formation of reading and writing, and from the end of the second grade - to the level of formation of written speech.

All specialists who deal with children's speech are well familiar with the scheme of the systemic development of normal children's speech by speech therapist N.S. Zhukova, compiled from a collection of scientific works by the famous Soviet linguist A.N. Gvozdev “Issues in the study of children’s speech” (1961), which describes the longitudinal course of his son’s children’s speech. This detailed and high-quality scheme for describing children's speech is still the most popular. But, since Gvozdev’s sphere of scientific interests were phonetics and morphology, the scientist did not record understanding speech by a child, and detailed systematic records of the vocabulary begin only from 1 year 8 months.

You can familiarize yourself with the table “Normal child speech development” from the Children’s Speech Data Fund of the Russian State Pedagogical University named after. A. I. Herzen, which reflects the main patterns of speech development from 0 to 7 years.

– Are there any drugs with proven effectiveness for “starting” speech and correcting speech problems? At what age and by which specialists is it advisable to examine a child for dysgraphia?

– A question about evidence-based medicine is a question for a neurologist, not a speech therapist.

By “launching” the speech. Firstly, this is a rather conventional name, there is no launch, this is a set of corrective measures. That is, it is impossible to start speech with one click - neither with pills, nor with any one technique.

Regarding the advisability of examining a child for the presence of dysgraphia. Basic writing function is developed by the end of 2nd grade. Then you can determine whether the writing skill has been successfully developed or not. That is, it would be more correct to examine the child for dysgraphia at the end of the 2nd year of school. But, unfortunately, in many schools they “say goodbye to the primer” in the middle of the first grade, begin to study spelling rules, and finish the process of developing writing skills by the end of the first year of study. And the result is a violation of ontogenesis. A child, having not completed one stage of development - without developing the skill of writing, begins another - the development of written speech. This is not indifferent to the skill itself - peculiar dysgraphic timing (tempo) errors may appear.

There is only one specialist in identifying dysgraphia - a speech therapist who deals with reading, writing, and written speech disorders. If a child also has neurological problems in the structure of the disorder, then a neurologist also looks at it, but in general this is the work of a speech therapist.

– One very important point. I am often asked how a speech therapist differs from a defectologist; I actually encounter this every day. Today, one mother tells me: “They took my son to a regular school, but he just needs to work with a defectologist.” I clarify: “With an oligophrenopedagogist?” She: “No.” Me: “Then with whom? Not with the typhlopedagogist?”

– Graduates of defectology departments of universities have a main specialty (teacher of the deaf, typhlopedagogist, oligophrenopedagogist) and an additional specialty – speech therapist. This additional specialty gives the right, for example, to a teacher of the deaf (defectologist) to work as a speech therapist in a specialized institution. It sounds something like this: a teacher of the deaf and a speech therapist at a school for type II children. In addition, defectology departments of universities have a speech therapy department, where they receive the specialty of speech therapist.

As a rule, “speech pathologists-defectologists” are those specialists who either want to impress mothers or camouflage the cacophony of the word “oligophrenopedagogist”. Those who have graduated from the departments of deaf pedagogy and preschool defectology can also introduce themselves as “speech pathologists-defectologists.” Those who graduated from the speech therapy department are very sensitive to their specialty and will not come up with anything unnecessary.

In some diplomas of speech therapists, the entry “special psychologist” is found; this is a synonym for the word “defectologist.” This specialty gives the right to work in a preschool educational institution as a speech therapist or defectologist.

In healthcare, the algorithm is stricter. For example, only a speech therapist who has studied at the Department of Speech Therapy can restore speech after a stroke, establish or evoke a voice after operations on the larynx, work with children after operations on the jaw and lip (for rhinolalia), and correct stuttering.

Speech therapist (defectologist) deals with any speech disorders that may occur both in the speech itself and in its design. As a rule, a speech therapist works with normotypical children. But even in case of severe speech disorders (alalia, dysarthria, stuttering), the child is also treated by a speech therapist.

– A child at 2.6 speaks only a few words like “mom, dad, grandma.” They put me on an oral contraceptive and prescribed me to take pantocalcin. Do I need to go to a speech therapist? And what should you do to get your child to talk?

– 2.6 is the age when it is actually possible to diagnose a functional delay in speech development. At this age, typical children speak in long, common sentences.

I will not answer about pantocalcin, this is not my competence. My recommendation is that the child be shown to a good speech therapist as early as possible, because there is already a clear speech delay. I repeat once again: per year there should be about 5-10 words, at 2 years - a short phrase, at 3 years - a common phrase consisting of 4-5 words. In this case this is not the case.

How to help you speak?

– What should I do to get my child to talk? The simplest recommendations for mom?

– You can arrange games with your child, pronounce all the words in the game. If the child is very small, you need to sit so that your eyes are on one level with his eyes so that he can clearly see your articulation. Try to speak the same words, in short phrases. Simplify your own speech to two-syllable words like “mom”, “dad”, that is, you can call shoes with the short word “bots”, a dog - “ava” and so on, try to come up with it yourself. The child’s name must be simplified: not Dementiy, but Dema, not Arseniy, but Senya.

Simplify words in terms of articulation, for example, use words with sounds that the child already knows how to speak, that is, with “p”, “m”, “b”, these are the sounds that first appear in the speech of children all over the world. Come up with some kind of joint album, paste in simple pictures or photographs of relatives and briefly call them by name and who is which family member. Build short, sketchy sentences.

If you have already typed a lot of animal names, say, “kisa”, “ava”, “Petya” - cockerel, “lo-lo” - penguin, “Misha” - bear cub, then you can add short action words to them: “go, Misha”, “go, Petya” and so on. And gradually the child will understand the algorithm of simple speech.

But it’s still better to turn to a speech therapist, because at 2.6 years you can practice not only speech, but also develop higher mental functions.

– What benefits do you recommend for joint activities between parents and children?

– Let me name a few very well-known and high-quality manuals. These are Elena Mikhailovna Kosinova’s manuals on the development of vocabulary and grammar. For younger children, this is the album of Olga Andreevna Novikovskaya, the album of Svetlana Vadimovna Batyaeva. There are a number of manuals for children, for preschool children by Tatyana Aleksandrovna Tkachenko, Olga Aleksandrovna Bezrukova, Olga Evgenievna Gromova. In general, try to choose books with bright, large pictures and clear instructions.

When to start worrying?

– When exactly do you need to notice that something is going wrong?On What pronunciation of sounds should you pay special attention to and try to correct them yourself? And tell us about speech therapy kindergartens: why are some people afraid of them like fire and how do they help a child?

– You definitely need to pay attention to the child’s behavioral characteristics and lack of speech, precisely when these two factors are combined. When a child does not look into the eyes, when a child does not respond to a name, when a child does not follow simple instructions, does not interact with parents, moves quite actively and somehow inappropriately, runs, “flapping his wings”, and at the same time there is no speech - this is a reason in order to go to the doctor.

I believe that you shouldn’t correct sounds yourself; after all, this should be done by professionals. In general, you should try to speak correctly and clearly with your child, so that the child can see articulation.

As for speech therapy kindergartens, this area has now undergone a serious reorganization, and what is happening there and how it is happening, there is no definite answer, because the requirements are changing all the time. But some time ago it was quite clear to me how speech therapy kindergartens exist, and I liked the organization in these kindergartens. The child studied with a speech therapist every day - these are frontal classes under the guidance of a speech therapist five times a week. Further: when the children went for a walk, the speech therapist took turns taking the children to individual lessons, that is, 2-3 times a week, where, for example, sounds were played. And in the afternoon, the teacher, who also had additional education, worked on the tasks given by the speech therapist.

So, look at the number of classes! Plus, the teacher in speech therapy kindergartens was obliged to include speech work at regular moments: ask specific questions, ask the child to repeat speech structures again and again. Such preparation qualitatively distinguished these children from other, ordinary children: children in speech therapy groups, especially with FFN, were perfectly prepared for school. And there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of, that is, not just not to be afraid, but one should definitely take the child there.

Today the situation has changed somewhat. Previously, there were three groups in speech therapy kindergartens: a group for children with general speech underdevelopment; group for children with speech impairments; group for children who stutter, but now the number of these groups is declining. For example, disorders of sound pronunciation are taken out of the scope of speech therapy kindergartens, but children with rather complex disorders remain: either they are non-speaking children, or they are children with some kind of combined disorders, with a complex structure of the defect. Therefore, I don’t know whether an ordinary child should go there, and, most likely, they won’t even take him there.

When is a speech therapist needed?

— How to choose a speech therapist? What should you pay attention to? Are there government centers where they work with children?

The question is how to choose a speech therapist, what are the professional requirements. The first is, of course, an education diploma. Every speech therapist must have a higher education diploma. A speech therapist must graduate from a pedagogical university, defectology faculty, or the department of speech therapy. Accordingly, the diploma must contain the entry “teacher-speech therapist” and “teacher (for example, if it is the department of speech therapy) of Russian language and literature for children of a special school of the 5th type,” that is, for children with severe speech impairments.

A speech therapist should come to a small child with a set of benefits. It is better if these are bright pictures. There should be a lot of pictures, and aids in general. Of course, a speech therapist must have beautiful, literate speech. The speech therapist must find an approach to the child, that is, begin to interact, and the examination must take place as playfully as possible.

Is there a government center where they work with children? Of course have. There are also kindergartens and clinics. But, as far as I know, it is very busy there.

- ABOUTIs it necessary to need a speech therapist if there are no special problems, except for the distorted pronunciation of “sh” and “zh”?

– You know, maybe you shouldn't do anything. I often say that in history there were many people who had problems with sound pronunciation, but, nevertheless, their contribution to history was quite high, that is, this did not hinder them in life. But if we are talking about a girl, and a girl often chooses a speech profession, or a profession directly related to speech, then incorrect sound pronunciation can hinder her in life.

I can tell you that it doesn't bother me if a person distorts sounds, I get used to it quite quickly. I hear, of course, but I try not to pay attention, you never know what kind of individual peculiarity a person has. But in our country, in our culture, in our society, it is not customary to pronounce sounds distorted; this is considered a violation of a certain standard.

If parents want to play sounds for their child, I, as a specialist, of course, support it, because I don’t see any problems in this. This is not a large number of lessons to put, in fact, one sound, this is one articulation for both [w] and [zh], when pronouncing the second sound, the voice is only added. I don’t see any particular difficulty; it’s easy to do in childhood.

Confusion with sounds

– According to the head teacher of the school, children who distort sounds will not be able to write correctly, because... information in the head is distorted. This is true?

– I think that the teacher did not mean distortion, but replacement of sounds. Let me briefly explain: distortion of sound is how it is not customary to speak in a language system, in this case Russian. For example, it is not customary to say interdental, lateral sounds, or the guttural “r,” but in this case the child understands that there is a guttural sound, but there is no guttural letter in the letter, so such a mistake cannot happen.

But if a child, for example, says “s” instead of “sh”, “Sasha” sounds like “Sasa”, then such an error may later appear in writing, because the child incorrectly perceives the sound by ear, replaces it in articulation, and accordingly, then will replace the letter. In this case, we are talking about a violation of phonemic hearing, and only a speech therapist can tell about such a violation.

– N and during an interview at school, parents were told that children who speak poorly distort information and then write poorly. Your opinion?

- Previously, a speech therapist could say: “Please play sounds for the children before school, if you don’t do this, then there will be mistakes in the writing.” Nowadays, many parents are educated enough to easily accept this controversial statement.

If a child replaces sounds, this is a violation of phonemic hearing, that is, he incorrectly perceives sounds by ear, accordingly, there may indeed be substitutions of letters in the letter. If a child speaks poorly, it means that he makes agrammatisms in oral speech, that is, he incorrectly uses endings in gender, number or case. For example, a child says: “Birds are sitting on trees,” the norm in the Russian language is “on trees,” respectively, in this case, as the child speaks, so can he write.

If this is not corrected in time, then it can turn into written speech. All agrammatic disorders manifest themselves in the 3rd-4th grade, when their own written speech appears.

– E If a child says either “v” or “l” in oral speech, will he confuse these letters in writing? And if a child rearranges syllables, does this then turn into a letter?

– If a child confuses “v” and “l”, then this is a distortion of sound; the child says “bilabial” [l], vaguely reminiscent of the sound [v]: “lamp”, “boat”. Such a violation should not affect writing, because it is a distortion or, in other words, a muscle disorder - a violation of the formation of the muscles of the articulatory apparatus, a violation of the anatomical structure. This can happen if the child has a severe phonemic hearing disorder. [В] and [л] are sounds from different phonetic groups; children usually distinguish them by ear.

If a child confuses or rearranges syllables, this is called a syllable structure disorder. This violation may well transfer to writing: to the violation of the syllabic structure is further added a violation of the formation of language analysis and synthesis, the child incorrectly identifies the first sound, the second sound, incorrectly selects a syllable from a word or rearranges syllables. As a result, dysgraphia is formed due to a violation of the formation of language analysis and synthesis.

Delayed speech development

– What is the procedure for ZRR? What examinations should I undergo? Do I need an EEG, ultrasound, MRI? A child at 3.7 barely speaks, what are the reasons? Which specialists should I take classes with? What can mom do on her own?

What is the diagnosis and treatment of alalia? Until what age can speech problems be corrected? What to do if the child does not want to study and repeat?

– It is impossible to schedule examinations in absentia. First, you should go to a neurologist. The neurologist necessarily examines the child, his reflexes, skin, talks to him, asks the mother in detail about the development of the child, the course of pregnancy and childbirth, and only after that an examination is prescribed. Yes, this could be an encephalogram (EEG) and Doppler ultrasound (USDG), but it is quite possible that some other examinations are needed.

MRI is a rather complex examination; it is usually prescribed strictly according to indications. That is, if, for example, a child has neoplasms, tumors, cysts or something similar, then yes. I repeat, all these appointments are made by a doctor (in this case a neurologist); no other specialist can prescribe such examinations.

Why doesn't the child at 3.7 say what the reasons are? There are a huge number of reasons. It is generally impossible to find out this in absentia, but even in a face-to-face conversation the reasons can only be approximately imagined. Yes, it could be an intrauterine problem, illness of the mother, illness of the child, environmental factors, toxicosis of the first and second half of pregnancy, swelling of the pregnant woman, some complications during childbirth, rapid birth, cesarean section. It’s probably worth even stopping, because all this can happen, and at the same time everything will be fine or it won’t turn into a problem.

Unfortunately, we will not find the root cause, but with some objective examinations, such as Doppler, it is quite possible to find out the characteristics of the blood flow, for example, whether there are problems with the inflow and venous outflow. But these will be indirect reasons that will help the neurologist understand the neurological symptoms.

Next, the mother asks if the child has alalia, what diagnostics and treatment are needed. This can be determined by a neurologist (the diagnosis is made by a psychiatrist), he will prescribe examinations and treatment, after which he consults a speech therapist and makes a speech therapy conclusion.

Until what age can speech problems be corrected? It depends on the problems. If there is no speech at the age of three, you need to actively, as quickly as possible, and preferably before the age of three, begin to engage in the formation and evocation of speech. If, for example, a five-year-old child, there is already the formation of lexical-grammatical, phonetic-grammatical categories, there is work with the quality of speech. But if a child does not speak at five, six, seven, and so on, you still need to work with this child. Yes, of course, the quality will be worse and the prognosis will be worse, but until the period of, say, puberty, I would actively advise parents not to give up and take care of the child.

You see, if a child is not Mowgli and is in society, in society, then he understands that speech is needed, that we all speak, and he sees and realizes this. Then he has the opportunity to speak until puberty. Well, how to speak: learn to speak words and phrases, let’s put it this way. If the child does not live in society, then the latest period is six years. If a child is not removed from the wild community, that is, from the environment of animals, before the age of six, then it is almost impossible to get such a child to talk.

What to do if the child does not want to study and repeat? Start, probably, not with speech classes, but with classes with a psychologist, because maybe the problem there is not speech. There are children who are absolutely immature, and you need to start playing, and in the game a desire to repeat and interact will appear. Nowadays there are a lot of play therapies (directive and non-directive, sand therapy, floortime, etc.).

Bilinguals

– I would like to know your opinion about a bilingual child. Please advise how best to teach a child other languages; should one parent speak two languages ​​with the child or follow the “one person, one language” rule?

– We must remember that speech is formed before the age of five, that is, at the age of five, this is the speech of an adult, therefore, if a child experiences some kind of speech delay, that is, before the age of three, speech is formed incorrectly in the structure of our language - few words, short sentences or there are none at all, then, of course, introducing a second language to such a child is fraught, because he does not even master the system of his native language. If a child copes well with his native language, that is, masters, for example, Russian well, then there is nothing wrong with being spoken to in a second language. Perhaps in this case there will be a slight delay in the formation of speech in both languages, and in total – still quite decent development, then the child will know two languages.

This practice existed in the Soviet Union; in many republics it was compulsory to study the native language and study Russian as a second language. And we know that almost all residents of the former republics of the Soviet Union, in addition to their own language, are fluent in a second language, Russian.

In what cases do I still not recommend speaking two languages ​​at once? When there is a severe speech delay or no speech at all, then it is better for the child to speak one language, no matter which one. It's clear that he's Russian – a very complex language, and it’s great when the first language is Russian, simply because it is very rich, beautiful, multifaceted, and anyone who knows Russian can easily master some other language.

In my practice, there was a child with a similar situation, dad was Spanish, mom was Russian, they lived in Valencia, the child spoke two languages ​​at once, mom spoke Russian to him, dad spoke Spanish, even Catalan, but still more It was the Spanish language that was present. And the child found himself in a situation of this bilingualism with a slight delay, which he could have easily coped with, but then the mother also took a bonna who spoke English. And some confusion occurred: a child with three languages ​​at once, a very small child, he was just over two years old.

I immediately asked my mother a question: how did the child react to the appearance of the bun? “Negative,” the mother said, but this is understandable, the child was already quite big, and suddenly, for no reason at all, he finds himself in a situation of speechlessness. When I looked at the child, I advised the parents to remove all languages ​​except Spanish for a short period of time, because the child goes to kindergarten, where the children speak Spanish, “and in any case, your child will know Russian, because you are a native speaker.” , you come to Russia quite often.”

Mom took my advice, and for six months they spoke only to their son in Spanish. Six months later, I looked at this child, he spoke excellent Spanish, and when I asked him something simple in Russian, he understood. From that moment it was clear that the child was completely in the Spanish language system and was about to start speaking Russian too.

Reader Questions

– Girl in 2.5 years old speaks a lot, but sometimes stutters a lot at the beginning of a sentence. This is fine?

– It is very difficult to say in absentia whether it is a stutter or a poltertern (stammer). Yes, it could just be a stumble and it will pass. Maybe it’s a stutter, that is, it’s no longer just a stutter, then yes, you need to contact a specialist, and more than one: a neurologist and a speech therapist. You need to work on your breathing, on your fluency of speech.

Sometimes this happens at this age because the child begins to talk loudly and a lot, so the articulatory muscular system cannot cope, and the child begins to stutter. This may go away on its own, but it is better to have a specialist look at it.

– Girl in 1.8 chatters in his gibberish, only “mom” can be distinguished, everything else is incomprehensible. Should anything be done?

– 1.8 is the age when a short phrase appears, and children usually have quite a lot of words. The child has a speech delay: the child does not speak in words or short phrases.

Should anything be done? I have already answered a similar question, look above.

– The child will go to kindergarten in September and will be the youngest in the group. There will be children who are almost a year older and who speak very well and fluently. Will such a difference harm the child? Or, on the contrary, will it help you speak?

- No, it won't hurt. On the contrary, good, clear and fairly correct speech of older children is a good model for the child. I don’t know whether this will help to talk or not, there may be different situations, but it may well be that it will help.

– The child is three years old, developed normally until two years old, there were many individual words and simple phrases. At two, epilepsy manifested itself, and speech gradually disappeared. Are there any methods for practicing at home? Epileptologists say that until the seizures stop, speech progress cannot be expected.

– I have already named these methods; in principle, there are no other methods for children with epilepsy or some other disorder. Yes, I agree, until the attacks are stopped, there is a high probability that speech will not actively develop, because each attack sets back the child’s development, nerve cells die, which may later be restored. But the most important task is to stop the child’s seizures.

- Mindalchika at 2.10 a small vocabulary, simple sentences of two words. Should I contact a specialist?

– Yes, the child has a delay in speech development. I repeat once again that by the age of three there should already be detailed phrases. Yes, the first doctor is a neurologist, and then you must visit a speech therapist.

“At almost three years old, the boy speaks almost all the words, but in general his speech is very poor. Even the parents have difficulty understanding half of the words; they construct sentences strangely (for example, “I, Nikita, will not go” instead of “I will go”), there are no sounds “r”, “sh”. How can parents fix this? Can a speech therapist help?

– Regarding sounds, you can wait, because at this age children may not yet pronounce complex sounds. Can a speech therapist help with speech development? Yes, it can help. If a child distorts the structure of a sentence - “I, Nikita, will go,” instead of “I will go,” then the speech therapist begins work on grammar. Without fanaticism, but we need to start.

– The 2.5-year-old girl speaks vaguely, her sentences are short and crooked. The neurologist prescribed Pantogam and Magne B6. There are plans to go to a speech therapy garden, first to the GKP. What else would you recommend in this case?

– I repeat that it is not my competence to refute or prescribe medications, but I can say that very often children with such complaints are indeed prescribed vitamins and some kind of nootropic drug; this is a fairly common practice. The child is still small and it is impossible to say why she speaks blurredly and does not pronounce a large number of sounds.

The fact that you are going to a kindergarten or to a group of public education groups is completely justified, this is the right move. Accordingly, there the child will first begin to study with a psychologist, and then, perhaps, with a speech therapist, and classes on stabilizing speech and producing sounds will be gradually introduced.

– Is it possible to begin correction of logoneurosis at three years of age? And does it need to be treated with drugs?

– Treatment with drugs is managed by a neurologist. Yes, they give mild sedatives for stuttering. But we need to understand the nature of stuttering and why this particular drug was prescribed to the child. From the age of three, a child is at risk for stuttering, because the child’s active speech development and desire to speak often outstrip the capabilities of the articulatory apparatus, and stuttering may occur. It is quite possible that it will pass very soon, and then the drugs will not be needed. But if this is not false, but true stuttering, then a neurologist should sort it out.

Is it necessary to study with a three-year-old child? I have the following wish: firstly, since the child reacts so actively and violently to speech, then in all other areas there should be complete calm. Maybe it makes sense to limit the child’s vibrant speech development, let him talk a lot in the family, but, say, limit communication with other children. It would be nice to go on vacation to the sea, to the mountains, to choose different wonderful places to relax, so that the child’s nervous system is calm, that is, spend this period in a somewhat relaxed state. This time.

Second: this child may be short of breath. Then it is quite possible to work with breathing. Of course, at three years old the level of voluntariness is still low, but light breathing exercises in a playful way can be done.

– A 3.5-year-old child changes the letters “g” and “d”, “k” and “t” in words. What to do?

– It's simple: contact a speech therapist. This is a very mild defect, a few sessions - and the speech therapist will introduce these sounds to the child, and you will only automate them, introduce them into speech.

– How to properly develop speech in a child 1.6 years old who speaks few words? What basic approaches to use?

– At 1.6, you need to actively live in the game with your child. Devote a lot of time to your child. Yes, he should have personal time and you should too, but, most importantly, if you play with a child, then play with him well. What are the first toys? These are animals, cars, dolls - call them in simple words. I already said earlier: Lala, Kisa, Ava, Petya and so on. And build some kind of plot, some kind of game, then the child will be interested in you, and simply because you speak to him in an accessible language. And in general, children at this age really love to interact with adults, just live with your child and enjoy this communication, and everything will be fine.

– When does a child begin to clearly pronounce sounds, in particular “r”? And if dad grasses, this doesn’t mean that the child will, copying him, also gracs?

– If the child began to speak correctly, most likely he no longer began to imitate his dad. This means that the articulatory apparatus is preserved, quite correct – long, wide, not narrow hyoid ligament, the so-called frenulum, and good vibration of the tip of the tongue. And the child has already mastered the correct pronunciation of this sound. That is, he heard that in the language system they pronounce it like this, and he began to pronounce it in the same way, without copying dad.

Can I try like dad? Maybe, but you can already tell him that it’s so wrong in our language, we need to do it differently.

I can give you this example: when my son was little, I started teaching sounds to children, and the children came to my house. My son was just over two years old, and he stood next to me and watched as I played sounds to other children. He spoke quite clearly, pronounced all the sounds, and suddenly began to imitate some children. I tried it and didn’t, because, in principle, if a child understands that this is not accepted, he will not say it.

[P] is a sonorant sound; it appears quite late in speech; according to the norm of speech development, it is acceptable to be closer to five. If everything goes according to plan, then there is no need to worry.

– At what age should measures be taken for normal pronunciation of “l”, “r”? The boy is 1 year 10 months old.

– At 1 year and 10 months - not necessary. If he has already begun to speak so well, most likely he is generally linguistically gifted; such a child will be quite capable of pronouncing sounds. But even if something is wrong with the muscles, it’s not a big problem, I think that a speech therapist can help.

– A 4-year-old girl says “r”; her parents forbid her to say “r” since it doesn’t work. Should I be concerned about grazing at this age?

– When a child begins to distort a sound, turning not the tip of the lingual muscle, but the root, then, most likely, he really has problems pronouncing this sound. That is, the child realized that something needed to be started, but if it started, most likely the sound will not appear on its own. But, I repeat, all recommendations should be given to the child in person; you still need to look to see if the frenulum is short, or if the tip of the tongue is weak; this is the functionality of a speech therapist.

Should it be prohibited to make a sound? Maybe it is necessary. There is something in this, the wrong acoustic pattern is not fixed. Although the absence of sound is also wrong. Four years is an age that is quite suitable for making sounds. It seems to me that you just need to see a specialist, and he will answer this question for you.

– HHave you read Valery Votrin’s novel “Speech Therapist”? How do you rate this work?

– No, I haven’t read this novel, but I know that the story is told from the point of view of a speech therapist, the main characters are a speech therapist and a journalist, just like we have now. And that it is they who want to preserve the country’s language. Good message. Yes, thanks, I'll read it.

Of course, I am for the purity of the language, for the preservation of the Russian language, for people to speak beautifully and competently (pronounce sounds, among other things), I have examples of the standards of speech therapists in the arts. One of the most important films for me – This is "The King's Speech." First of all, the film itself is wonderful. Secondly, the actor plays the main role of a speech therapist absolutely professionally, I can say that the techniques shown there are very effective. I think this is a good example of popularizing our profession.

And the second – the famous film “For Family Reasons”, where the speech therapist is played by Rolan Bykov. This is a joke, a parody of the speech therapist, but it was a success, she firmly stuck to the speech therapist for many years. And I always and everywhere say: God forbid that this should happen in life, because, unfortunately, there is no professional selection of applicants, that is, many applying for a place as a student at the speech therapy department simply do not know how to pronounce sounds. Therefore, in a sense, this is a prophetic film. Of course, it’s a shame for the profession. During the times of the Soviet Union it was a joke, but now, unfortunately, it is not really a joke, there is some truth in it.

– For what reason do many absolutely healthy and developed children, with a rich passive vocabulary, start talking late? Is this a trend?

– No, this particular fact is not tendentious. There are several ways to try to explain this phenomenon, but this is only hypothetical, I emphasize this word:

1. There are so-called “hoarder children”; they are very critical of their speech. They don’t like the result, so they remain silent or speak somewhat autonomously (“in their own” language).

2. There are “children who are products of the extroverted world,” that is, they copy the world. Let me give you an example. Many parents only see their children sleeping; nannies or grandmothers tell their children that mom and dad work a lot. This plot was embodied in the production of dolls with closed eyes, and, imagine, children like to play with such dolls because it is a projection of their own world. Likewise, a child who understands everything well and is silent establishes a one-way connection similar to working with a computer, but it is impossible to talk to him.

Still, this is complacency, it shouldn’t be this way, and the rich history of human development can help us. Children should begin to try their articulatory apparatus from the age of one year. Speech delay may vary. Let's say the child spoke, the parents thought that was enough. But when such a child goes to a speech therapist during medical examination, it turns out that there is a delay, a lower level compared to his potential level of speech development.

If a child begins to speak on time, then his own imperfect product of production does not bother him, he does not care how to speak, the main thing is that there is pronunciation itself, pleasure from the very process of speaking and the joy of having brought something pleasant to adults (relatives are usually very emotional respond to the child's first words). Fortunately, such children still exist.

– The child began to speak at the age of 4. At five or six there were not many sounds. At 8 years old - problems with writing, missing letters in words. The child is inattentive and creative, and can be distracted. Is it possible to do something on your own this summer?

– It is possible and necessary. I recommend taking an extended, high-quality consultation with a speech therapist who deals specifically with writing and written speech disorders. Perhaps this is not an hour, but a two-hour consultation, where the speech therapist will explain in detail how to work with the child and offer benefits that can be used to study. Personally, I really like to consult such parents, because if the parent is motivated and asks such a question, then most likely he will follow my recommendations. Therefore, please contact us, we will be happy to help you.

– The boy is almost 5 years old, he speaks poorly, cannot form sentences, cannot pronounce “r” and “l”, and speaks in monosyllabic sentences. What are his chances?

– Five years is still a very good age to stabilize all functions, including speech. You have two active years ahead of you before school, I highly recommend organizing quality classes not only with a speech therapist, but also with a psychologist, including classes with a neuropsychologist, starting with sensorimotor correction, then including cognitive correction. I would like a psychologist to work with the child on the development of higher mental functions. As for the speech therapist, it is necessary to develop both the lexico-grammatical and phonetic-phonemic aspects; these are fundamentally different activities.

If a child has problems with breathing, with prosody, then it is necessary to connect some kind of hardware correction, for example, biofeedback, so that diaphragmatic breathing is formed and there is a long exhalation. Perhaps, if the child has problems with auditory perception, connect Tomatis. That is, include a comprehensive correction, then there will be success. An integrated approach helps any child.

Good luck to you!

Prepared by Tamara Amelina

Why does a child start speaking late? How to teach him to pronounce sounds correctly? What to do if your baby has hearing problems?

Speech therapist Farida Bulatova, who devoted thirty-six years to her profession, told the RG correspondent about this and much more.

How did you get into the profession?

Farida Bulatova: God brought. Next to my house there was a boarding school for children with hearing impairments. And I’ve been communicating with them since childhood, skating on their skating rink. But in Soviet times, such children were perceived as somehow strange. It was believed that there were no sick or undeveloped people in our country. It was not customary to talk about this. Then it so happened that I myself had hearing problems for some time.

And when I grew up, I decided to enter the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute named after Lenin at the defectology department. At that time, there were only three universities in the USSR where one could obtain this specialty: in Moscow, Leningrad and Kyiv.

I graduated from college and have been in the profession ever since. For many years she taught deaf children, then worked at a school for children with speech impediments. I also had the opportunity to lead the Republican Medical and Pedagogical Consultation.

And from my own experience I can say that now more and more children are born with various disorders, and not just speech. Of course, they need constant help, so, unfortunately, we will not be left without work.

What is the reason for this trend?

Farida Bulatova: It will sound trivial, but first of all it is due to bad ecology. The World Health Organization published data 20 years ago according to which out of 10 young women, only eight can normally carry and give birth to a child. And now there are even fewer of them. And these are mostly women living in large cities. Today, very often young and seemingly healthy women are forced to remain in conservancy from the very beginning. You have to suffer through pregnancy. And all this affects the general health of children, including their speech. A large percentage of disorders are caused by prematurity. Of course, the alcoholization of the population also affects this.

At what age should a child start speaking? Is there a strict age limit?

Farida Bulatova: Naturally, this limit is different for everyone. And you don’t need to focus only on speech here. If the child understands those around him, does what his parents ask him to do, is emotionally alive and does not have mood swings, then everything is fine. And he can speak by the age of three.

But if by this age the child does not understand speech addressed to him and can sit indifferently for a long time, then, of course, the alarm should be sounded. It is necessary to check the child’s hearing and take him to a specialist.

My son started saying "dad" before "mama". This, of course, pleased his father’s pride. And when I finally began to say “mama,” this word seemed to supplant the previous one. Now he calls both his wife and me mom. Is it really impossible for a child to fit these two words into his memory?

Farida Bulatova: This is fine. Because some children actually say “maba” or “pama”. He hears, understands, but his lips are not yet so obedient to him. The combination "ma" is easier than "pa". No need to be offended by this. In addition, children do not distinguish phonemes very well at first; they often confuse them. It seems to the child that he is saying one thing, but it turns out something else.

When should a child put words into sentences?

Farida Bulatova: By two years. Previously, it was believed that by this age children were just developing their speech. Now experts have a different opinion: first, the child absorbs everything like a sponge, and then gives it away. It happens that some situation forces him to speak.

At what age should he learn to pronounce sounds?

Farida Bulatova: Usually, speech therapists say, by the age of five. But I believe that we should start at four years old. Especially if you feel that the child cannot make many sounds.

And if correct speech has not been formed by the age of five, you should definitely go to a specialist. And before the age of six you have time to put on sounds. Otherwise, the child will not be ready for school. And then there will be problems with writing and reading. There are children who cannot write dictations and confuse sounds: voiced and unvoiced, consonants and vowels. This is exactly the case when you didn’t work enough in childhood.

How can parents help their children in this difficult matter?

Farida Bulatova: First of all, you should never coddle with children. Speak correctly - they should have a good example in the person of their parents. And even if a child says something funny and it makes us very happy, we should not follow his lead and imitate incorrect speech.

It is also very important to teach young children to use their hands. The better a child is with his hands, the better he speaks. He must be allowed to put on his shoes and dress himself. It would be nice to teach him to tie his shoelaces from the age of five. And teach small children to string dryers or beads on a string. It is very useful to sculpt from plasticine. But, if you are afraid that your child will get dirty, make him salt dough. And while you sculpt, talk to the children, enrich their ideas about life.

As you know, speech defects are often associated with a short frenulum of the tongue. And in this case, experts recommend trimming it. Is it possible to do without this operation?

Farida Bulatova: If it is clear from an early age that the child’s frenulum is short, then it is better to trim it. This can be determined easily by eye. When the baby tries to stick out his tongue, this very notorious frenulum prevents him from doing so completely. As a result, the tongue seems to bifurcate and is shaped like a petal. In this case, it is better to operate on the baby. At this age, everything heals and is forgotten faster, and most importantly it will help the normal development of speech. Although I have had cases when I put the sound “r” on children with a short bridle. But this is only possible if the child really wants to get rid of the defect and therefore tries hard in class.

We have dealt with standard cases. What to do if a child has hearing impairment? Is it always possible to detect this at an early age?

Farida Bulatova: Unfortunately, this is difficult to diagnose. Therefore, you should always listen and peer into your child. The Republican Children's Hospital has a hearing aid center where you can get examined.

Let's say parents find out that their child has hearing problems. They are, of course, under extreme stress. What should they do, how should they behave? lead?

Farida Bulatova: Yes, it’s very difficult to come to terms with this, to realize that your child is not like everyone else. Here we need to pull ourselves together and think about his future. Who will help the child in such cases if not the parents?

Moreover, medicine does not stand still. The country currently has a free government program. If a child has hearing impairment or deafness, a chip is implanted into the cochlea in clinics in Moscow and St. Petersburg. With the help of this device, children begin to hear. But we cannot rest on this, we must continue to work with them, and here we will need the help of specialists. Just don’t delay the operation; the chip will be implanted for up to eight years.

I’ve always wondered how you can teach a child to pronounce sounds if they can’t hear them? This is magic.

Farida Bulatova: Firstly, all children are now provided with sound-amplifying equipment. But it’s not like glasses: you put it on and you see right away. The device is very carefully selected. Someone does not hear high-pitched sounds - birdsong or a soprano voice. And with the help of a hearing device, the child distinguishes whether a word is long or short, and understands individual syllables and words. Visual perception also comes to the rescue. For example, I wrote the letter "m", then pronounce it in my ear. Then I let my student feel how my cheeks vibrate when I make this sound. But the main thing is that the child must trust you, only then will he start talking.

How do children themselves perceive their deafness?

Farida Bulatova: It’s easier for those who were born deaf. He just doesn't know any better. And besides, the child studies in a specialized school with children like him. He is in his own environment.

But if a child had hearing and suddenly lost it, then this, of course, is a tragedy. I have encountered similar cases. One day a twelve-year-old boy came to our school and became deaf. He suffered greatly and was suicidal. We were just guarding him so that he wouldn’t do anything to himself.

And when during classes they had to force him to say something, but he couldn’t do it, he shouted in hysterics: “It’s good for you, you hear! It’s easy for you to say “repeat, repeat,” but I can’t!” Of course, the easiest way in this case is to hug the child and cry with him. But you need to pull yourself together and continue to work - tears won’t help your grief. Feeling sorry and crying is not a productive path. We need to instill confidence in the child.

To make your child speak faster

It is important that parents constantly talk to their child and encourage him to communicate. For example, if a baby wants to take something, you don’t need to immediately give it to him. Encourage him to ask for the item, name it, and express his desire. Maybe at first with a gesture or some kind of sound.

People have always had a good tradition of singing lullabies and playing pats with the child. It would seem that an indifferent baby is sitting in a stroller, but in fact he hears everything and understands everything. And if the mother turns to him, smiles and tells him something, the child will inevitably want to do the same.

The big mistake of modern parents is that they load their children with toys. Maybe this is due to the fact that they are trying to pay him off in this way. I want to watch TV, sit at the computer and go on a visit. In Soviet times, children played with sticks, pieces of glass, and rags. Children's imagination must be awakened and developed. You should not buy a toy that pees, cries and talks on its own. She won't give anything to the child. Offer him a rag, let him make a doll out of it and speak for it himself.

Children (as well as adults) can lose their hearing at different ages for one reason or another. Sometimes this happens before birth. If hearing loss occurs before the child has mastered speech, speech does not develop at all; If the baby was already able to speak when hearing loss occurred, he begins to lose speech and may become deaf and mute. Sometimes the lesion covers a very large part of the hearing organ, and then doctors talk about total deafness; if the affected area is smaller, then this hearing condition is classified by doctors as hearing loss, and children are called hard of hearing. Deaf-muteness is overcome thanks to the special organization of their lives. As a result, children remain deaf (or hard of hearing) by diagnosis, but become speaking. Their auditory perception of speech also develops intensively.

Deaf people are just like everyone else

Deaf children are completely ordinary children. They also love to run, play, dance, have fun and be naughty, experiment with different objects, build, sculpt and draw. But very often they have no one to play with. Parents of hearing children do not encourage them to communicate with deaf children, and sometimes even prevent such contacts. Why? Because an untrained, deaf child does not speak. Instead of articulate speech, he makes exclamations, sometimes uses gestures, and does not understand spoken speech. In this way, his behavior differs sharply from his peers with normal hearing, who, although due to age and cannot speak, understand addresses. And their inarticulate babble is perceived by others as something completely natural (“After all, he is still small!”). Such situations traumatize the parents of a deaf child, and over time the child himself begins to feel different from others. But hearing impairment, no matter how severe it may be, is not an insurmountable obstacle to a child’s learning to speak. All deaf children have some remnants of hearing, so appropriate perception must be developed even in cases where these remnants are minimal. When certain conditions are created, deaf children achieve a high level of development of both speech and hearing. Children with hearing loss should live with hearing people and have the same opportunities as them. This is one of the main tasks of teaching and raising such children. How can this goal be achieved?

Guide to action

First of all, it is necessary to identify the presence of hearing pathology in a child as early as possible (before a year, when speech is not yet developed). Do not neglect preventive examinations with an ENT doctor (in the first 2-4 months, in 1 year and thereafter - every six months). If parents have suspicions and it seems to them that the baby is behaving “differently from other children,” they should immediately contact a specialist. He will conduct an initial examination and, if necessary, refer you to a specialized medical center, where the baby will be more thoroughly examined. Otherwise, you can miss precious time, and it will be much more difficult to catch up. After consultation with an ENT doctor, examination and establishment of an accurate diagnosis, you should immediately purchase for your baby two hearing aids – one for each ear is required(preferably programmable or digital). Advice “to save money” to make do with one should be rejected immediately! Doctors must select an individual operating mode for the devices in the presence of the child. The baby is allowed to listen to various sound signals using devices and the responses to them are recorded. In addition, audiogram data is used when setting up the device. Hearing prosthetics is the most important condition for the full auditory-speech development of a deaf child. All children who are deaf or hard of hearing should wear hearing aids at all times. With their help, they will develop auditory perception and oral speech. But that is not all. As soon as the doctor makes a diagnosis, you should immediately begin special classes with the child. The sooner this process begins, the more successful the rehabilitation will be. Parents themselves will be able to conduct classes, under the guidance of specialists and with the help of teaching aids, which describe in great detail the types of classes and techniques with which you can teach a deaf child to speak.

How to conduct classes?

Oral speech development

No special objects are required to play with a deaf child. The most common toys are used - dolls, cars, animals, cubes, and so on. But the game should be real, and not turn into formal exercises. While operating with each toy, you need to momentarily bring it to your lips, placing it at chin level (so that the baby can see the articulation), and call the toy a simple onomatopoeic word, for example: Lala, beep-bee, aw-aw, meow. The child perceives these words with the help of vision and the remainder of hearing, since he wears hearing aids. A daily repeating situation with the use of these toys, but in different play actions, will lead to the baby saying some word himself. After the first, a second, a third will appear... The pronunciation may turn out to be inaccurate, approximate, but this does not matter - the main thing is that the baby will begin to indicate the names of objects using speech. Later, babbling words need to be replaced with full-fledged, commonly used ones. Adults should specially organize play situations during which the child identifies actions, and parents denote them with words: walks, runs, sleeps, cries, eats... When the baby begins to use these words independently (even with approximate pronunciation), it’s time to use whole phrases, for example, mom is sitting, the car is driving, dad is walking, the dog is running... In this activity, the child simultaneously learns to speak and understand speech orally.

Reading training

In addition to oral speech, it is important to teach your child to read. Young children can be given signs with words written in block letters. At first, children perceive words holistically, they are not taught individual letters, and they do not read syllables. From the very first steps, reading becomes a meaningful process for them: behind every word there is an idea, an image. It is necessary to constantly work to ensure that children understood speech, because reading or repeating what another person said does not mean understanding.

Teaching writing

At the same time as reading, you should teach your child to write. You can write using markers in block letters on unlined album sheets. In this case, the baby freely places his hand on the sheet and can write letters of any size in any place and direction. Over time, the nature of the letter is streamlined, it becomes smooth and neat.

Development of auditory perception

Classes on the development of auditory perception are of particular importance. After all, wearing devices in itself does not give the desired effect - children need to be taught to listen to the sounds of the surrounding world, to speech, to isolate different elements in it, so that the structure of words perceived by ear is gradually clarified. Developing auditory perception helps deaf children better understand the spoken language of those around them. Classes to develop auditory perception should be conducted daily for 20-30 minutes for many years.

Learning to communicate fully

So, the children learned to speak, although their speech is peculiar and often resembles foreign speech. With the devices it is much easier for them to understand the people around them; already at preschool age they can read and write. And yet, kids still do not participate in games with other children. Why is this happening? Most likely, adults are too preoccupied with the educational side of a child’s life and do not think about his place in the microsociety. And you need to think about this from the moment you start classes. It is very important that parents did not hide their child's deafness in cases where others express surprise at the quality of his speech. After all, the cause of this is hearing loss, and not some terrible contagious disease. Required specifically create a space for a child-friendly attitude . Not only relatives, but also acquaintances and closest neighbors in the house should know that parents are working with the baby, teaching him to speak, listen, and understand the speech of others. What if from time to time demonstrate them baby's success in the accumulation of words, writing, reading, drawing, making handicrafts, dancing or mastering physical exercises, the positive effect will not be long in coming. The normal behavior of a child attracts not only adults to him, but also children, arouses sympathy and a desire to “be friends” - at least to play. Speech recedes into the background, but during the game it becomes absolutely clear that deaf child speaks (even if he does not speak fluently), the situation helps. The wall of misunderstanding is destroyed, communication becomes free and natural. It is important that the number of friends a deaf child has increases. For this, it is useful for parents not to be content with playing in the yard from time to time. invite hearing children to your home and organize some interesting activities for the whole company and games. This way, a deaf child will become closer and more interesting to other children, because he can do a lot, comes up with interesting games, and explains how to play them. Parents need to cultivate in a child such qualities as kindness, willingness to help other people, and attentiveness to others. His successful adaptation in society largely depends on these character traits. Therefore, a child needs such qualities bring up . For example, you can bring treats with your baby to neighbors on the occasion of a family holiday, when you meet, ask a friend how he is feeling, or invite the baby to make a handmade gift for one of your relatives or friends for his birthday.

Fostering independence

Gradually, from a relatively narrow circle of acquaintances, the child moves into a much wider space. And the family must properly prepare for this transition. At first, the baby simply goes to the store with his parents, and they include him in the shopping process. For example, dad pays money, and son or daughter receives goods from the seller. Later, the child will have to go shopping himself. First, parents should discuss and talk with him about the vocabulary that will need to be used when purchasing this or that thing. In order for the new manifestation of independence to be successful, it is better for parents to warn the seller in advance that a deaf child will come to him. In this case, the child will be understood correctly, and will not be reprimanded for incorrect pronunciation. Since now there are many shops, tents, and kiosks near our houses, residents of the area and sellers, as a rule, know each other. Therefore, an agreement will not be so difficult. Gradually, the child will master nearby retail outlets and new forms of behavior for him.

Hello big world!

The older a deaf child gets, the more opportunities he has for inclusion in society. He becomes a subscriber to the library, visits museums, theaters with an understandable repertoire, even concerts for children. Parents should also prepare all these events in advance. The child must be told where he will go, what he will see there, and introduced to new words; he is also prepared for correct behavior in museums and theaters. Upon returning home, you should talk with your child again, discuss him and your impressions of the exhibition or performance. Thus, deaf children are introduced to culture on the one hand, and integrated into society on the other. Obviously, attending kindergarten also contributes to full communication. A deaf child must take an active part in concerts for parents, holiday matinees and other similar events. He can read poems, dance, play some musical instrument . This is also an important step in the socialization of children with hearing impairments - publicity teaches children to overcome shyness and fear of a large audience. Very useful for the socialization of deaf children excursions and hikes , in which family acquaintances and friends of the child participate. Under these conditions, he learns to act in a group, in a team; learns to subordinate his interests and desires to the desires and interests of others. The child’s understanding of the world around him expands, and the child’s speech improves, because he communicates with a large number of speaking and hearing people of different ages. Great benefit for deaf children participation in the work of clubs and sections . Such kids must study in them independently, communicating with the teacher and other children without parental participation . Adults can be interested in their child’s success by communicating directly with the head of the circle or section. The implementation of the described models of education and inclusion of deaf and hard of hearing children in society will help them grow up liberated, open to contacts, and independent. Some deaf children know one or even several foreign languages ​​and study music. Many study in regular schools and vocational schools together with hearing peers, study at universities (at law, economics and other faculties), and can successfully work in a variety of positions. Thus, subject to certain conditions, deaf and hard of hearing children become full-fledged members of society. The main thing is to help them overcome difficulties and become masters of their destiny. Good morning!