Toddler Talking

Common Speech Problems in Young Children

By Jacqueline Bodnar

When Vickie Muhammad's son was born he passed all his newborn screenings. Yet as he began to grow, she suspected something was wrong. He wasn't picking up on words at a rate that most of the charts showed he should be, and she had to constantly talk loudly to get his attention.

She insisted on a referral to a speech therapist from her pediatrician. The therapist began by giving him another hearing test. "This test showed that my son had a hearing loss," says Muhammad. "We got hearing aides and he was given speech therapy."

Little did she know, her son's hearing loss was progressive. "Thanks to the wonderful speech therapist and teachers, today he is enrolled in an oral school that teaches him how to speak and listen," says Muhammad.

"The common speech problems I see in my office are speech delay, stuttering and articulation difficulties," says Dr. Dave Olson of the Grand Traverse Children's Clinic in Traverse City, Mich. "These are quite commonly seen in a pediatric office, and often they are self-limited problems that resolve with time." Dr. Olson explains that he first conducts a hearing test and then will usually refer the child to a speech specialist.

Sandra Coulson, president of the International Association of Orofacial Myology (IAOM), is one such specialist that gets the referrals. As an Orofacial Myologist, she specializes in working with the muscles of the face and tongue. These muscles facilitate proper movement of the facial muscles to be able to create specific speech sounds.

According to IAOM, an orofacial myofunctional disorder is believed to be prevalent in 81 percent of children that show speech or articulation problems. The disorder involves incorrect habits of using the tongue, jaws, lips and face. There are several things that can cause such disorders, including the following:

• Developmental abnormalities
• Improper oral habits (e.g., thumb sucking, teeth grinding, nail biting)
• Enlarged tonsils or allergies that are restricting nasal airway

Want to see more?

• Early Intervention Key in Language Development
• Late Talkers: Correctly Diagnosing Speech Disorders
• Stuttering or Learning to Speak?
• Talk about it!