What do you do in speech therapy with a non-verbal toddler with autism? Speech-language pathologist Carrie Clark explores therapy ideas in this video:
Components of Intervention to Consider:
1.Parent Training: Teach good language modeling techniques to the parents
- Using shorter utterances
- Using sign language
- Self-Talk
- Parallel-Talk
- Labeling a child’s body language, actions, or vocalizations using a single word
2. Introduce AAC during therapy, try different methods (sign language, voice output, picture systems, etc.). See what she will use to communicate her biggest wants and needs.
3. Try to get the child to imitate speech sounds for highly preferred objects. If she won’t do that, try imitating non-speech sounds, oral motor movements, or other movements.
4. Encourage joint attention:
More Resources for Speech-Language Pathologists:
Looking for more therapy ideas and resources to help you provide the BEST services to your clients? Join us in The SLP Solution, our membership program for speech-language professionals! Inside the membership, you’ll find:
- Step-By-Step Guides for teaching a variety of speech/language/communication skills
- Pre-Made Worksheets and Therapy Activities for hundreds of different topics
- Training Videos for dealing with difficult disorders or problems
- Answers to Your Questions in our exclusive SLP community
- Tools and Resources to help you with your paperwork and admin tasks
- Continuing Education through our monthly webinars and webinar recordings
To join us in the full SLP Solution, or to snag a free membership, click on the button below!
Nice video Carrie, Great list of intervention tips… like your cheat sheet too. Thanks for putting this out there.
You are so welcome! Glad to help!
Carrie,
Thanks for the video. For preverbal, autistic toddlers – what do you recommend for introduction into AAC? I’m reading more that PECS is not looked favorably upon by the autistic community as it does not promote a person’s autonomy. But if we want to introduce the idea of icons (icon represents desired item), would you recommend starting low tech with a single photo and modeling pointing to or picking up that picture to show them? Or even putting a single picture on an ipad screen. This would be for a 2 year old with no prior exposure to AAC. Thanks!
Hello, AA!
Thank you so much for reaching out. Unfortunately, we get a ton of questions every day about how to solve specific speech/language problems. Since we have such a small staff, we aren’t able to answer every question that comes through on the website, social media, or via email. If you are a parent, we suggest you reach out to a local speech-language pathologist who can work with your child directly and answer your question.
If you are another speech-language professional, we have created a membership where we pay a full staff to answer questions like this on a regular basis. We would be more than happy to answer your question inside the membership program. We’re able to answer more questions in here because we have a full library of questions that we’ve already answered so our staff can either link you to the answer if it exists, or write you a custom response if needed. We’d love to see you inside the membership!
Click Here to Become a Member: https://www.slpsolution.com/pediatric-signup/