Speech Update

Cecilia had another speech evaluation recently to check her progress and see if we needed to reapply to continue speech therapy into the new year...  Wait, did I every catch you up on what happened with the school district???  I don't think so.  Long story short- they finally got around to evaluating her at the school district and guess what, they qualified her for services.  However, when I went and checked out the preschool, and met the speech therapist, I was not in the least impressed!  The speech therapist had way to many kids on her case load, and she had a speech impediment herself.  Not sure how she got that job.  Needless to say, we have kept Cecilia in private therapy, and at the same preschool, and she has been making wonderful progress.

As I was saying, she had another evaluation done in mid December to check her progress.  For comparison, her scores on the evaluation have improved, all though she is still below where we know she could be.  The tests generates three scores.  The first score is an overall score.  The average range is 85-115, in June, she scored a 78, this time she scored an 84.  The second score is a percentile.  In June, she scored in the 17th percentile and now she is at 22nd percentile.  The third number is an age equivalent.  In June, Cecilia was scored to be speaking at a two year old - zero month level, or 10 months behind.  This time, she scored at age 2 years 8 months, or 8 months behind.  The other number they give us the number of errors made.  In June she made 47 errors and this time around she made only 36 errors.  So while she is improving, she is still needing help.  And although it looks like she has not progressed a lot, she really has, and she is right on the cusp of making some major breakthroughs. 

As far as her sounds go, she has mastered the 'w' and starting 's' sounds (st, sn, sp, sm, etc.)  The 'w' was huge for her.  The 'w' is a very early sound that most kids master by age 2.  She is talking and talking all the time now, and we don't really have any further concern with her putting words together.  She has also come a long way as far as marking the middle and ending sounds of words.  We still have some issues in this area, but not nearly as much as we did.  She is now working on the 'k' sound.  This is a more difficult sound, and some kids don't master this sound till closer to age four, but it is important that she get the help she needs to learn it now.  Once she learns the 'k' sound, 'g' follows pretty quickly.  Same with 'f' and 'v'.   She knows the 'f' sound, but will not use it regularly.

She loves going to speech and playing with Brianna.  Brianna has been so impressed with her progress and is confident that she will be able to "graduate" within a few months.