David Goes to Speech Therapy

Many of you know that David's speech is at times less than intelligible! While it has improved, it is still tough to understand, unless you are us! Today was his first appointment with the speech therapist, who I just found to be wonderful! I took David to Jason's school, which he was sooooooo excited about. He thinks he should be in school since he turned five. We walked into the therapists office, and he (the therapist) stood up and said, "Hi, I'm John." To which David reached out his hand and said, "Hi John! I'm David!" as if it were a peer and they were 20 years old! They then did the little evaluation, which proved just as I suspected. I told them that David does not enunciate or say final consonants, which is exactly what happened in the evaluation. He can say all of his sounds correctly (even his Rs, which are usually last to develop - between ages 5 and 7), if he just takes the time to do it, but he just doesn't. There is no way to correct a child who does not say there final consonant on nearly every word. You would never get through a whole sentence without complete frustration on the part of the adult and child. John said that David has created his own dialect, and needs to be taught proper English. On the positive side, he said he can understand 75% of what David says, and with many children, he can only understand about 25%. I guess that made me happy. It's not as bad as I thought! He will continue to see David a few times, but also gave me some activities to do with David at home. David talked about school a lot today. He loved going and is excited to do the exercises, so I think it will be fun! David going to school is going to be so interesting. His teacher will either love him, or He will drive him/her crazy. It was nice that John saw the good in him even though he was wiggly and up and down in his chair and changing subjects, etc. David kept him laughing through much of the one hour session with all the little things he says. I pray for a teacher who will see the positives in David in order to make up for the thinks that drive many teachers crazy. He CANNOT sit still. We practice, and it is terribly hard! And he talks A LOT, and apparently in his own dialect!! But he is one amazing kid, and I truly can't imagine our home without the joy that he brings!