I know it's been quite some time since I've posted any current videos of Nate. Time has been flying by--I will soon. We're quickly approaching the end of the school year and looking forward to a break from nearly daily speech therapy.
Nate has been saying and using so many more words! At times it is still difficult to understand him, but he's able to tell us so much more! He's finally able to say the long e sound (like the e in me). It use to come out of his nose! The therapists had tried working on this sound for a short period of time, but decided to wait. It seems to have come on its own. To be honest, it was one that I wasn't sure if he'd every be able to say correctly and there is no way to show someone how to make that particular sound.
Nate's been using his Go Talk more in therapy and we're still still waiting on a larger machine that is able to hold more visuals and recordings. He is using it to work on sentence structure, to share information with friends, as well as support his language skills.
In class last week, he told one of his teachers, "Spider over here!" He's even asking more questions. In one therapy session his SLP was having him talk about things he did over the weekend. When she told him that she had popcorn, he asked "You watch movie?"
The best part of his latest progress is that he is self-correcting. Meaning, that at times when he hears himself say something and he hears it isn't a close approximation, he'll say it again. Last week we were watching Blues Clues and he was imitating something being said on TV. On his own, he said repeated it, heard that it wasn't quite right and said it again. And just this morning I was making cinnamon rolls and he asked what was for breakfast? I told him to look and see and his first attempt at saying cinnamon rolls wasn't quite right, so he said it again on his own. Words like cinnamon rolls are still quite difficult for him--to get all the positioning and muscles coordinating, but it's huge that he's attempting these words on his own and correcting his own mistakes!
