Autism begins to manifest its symptoms as soon as the child reaches age 3 while language delays are usually evident as early as 2 years of age. An autistic child will have trouble relating to others, sometimes decidedly so. Speech and language therapy is one of the first treatment options for autism recommended by doctors. It is basically a type of communication impairments therapy that can play an important role in helping autistic children deal with the disorder and get into a normal life.
How Speech & Language Therapy Helps
Once a child is diagnosed with autism, professionals through speech and language therapy can help them achieve improvement in communication and enhance their life quality. This type of therapy introduces different alternatives to speak to those children with little or no speech ability. These also include the use of modern technology that is particularly designed to build and improve communication skills.
Here are a few ways how speech therapy is handy for children with autism.
Help Develop The Ability To Express
Speech and language therapy is mainly focused on how the children with autism will learn to speak and improve their communication so that they are able to form relationships and function in their surroundings. This kind of treatment aids the autistics to develop the ability to express their needs, feelings, and exchange ideas with others. Children are taught both verbal and non-verbal communication skills to be able to make eye contact with others and begin a conversation and sustain it for long. Learning these skills not only aids children to get involved within the family but also helps them be able to make a relationship with their peers outside of the home.
Help Understand The Communication
With speech & language therapy, children displaying autism symptoms learn to understand what is being communicated to them. They are taught the verbal and non-verbal communication skills that other people use in their daily lives. It also helps autistics recognize different clues of body language and facial expressions. Moreover, speech and language therapy play a vital role in helping autistics learn to start their communication without having others to initiate.
Help Communicate With Peers
Some autistics often fight back with the naturalness and unpredictability of casual episodes of communication. They may also have very specific interests and find it difficult talking about other things. Speech & language therapy teaches children with autism various strategies to mingle with other children in order to be able to make friends and experience social success.
Help Learn Communicate Like Others
Autism often causes children to have uncommon language processing and characteristic learning patterns which eventually leads to difficulty developing spoken language. Sometimes, they learn spoken language in portions without breaking what they hear into words and sounds. In addition to addressing the above signs, speech therapy also helps autistics overcome ‘echolalia’ – an autism symptom where children repeat long parts of their favorite TV shows without even understanding what they are saying.
Help Articulate Words and Sentences
Children with autism have difficulty articulating sounds and making sentences. They also struggle with abstract language and vocabulary based on the context for meaning. Time concepts and non-literal languages like indirect instructions, hints, and idioms can also be problematic for autistics. These are the areas where speech & language therapy can be very helpful for children with this condition to improve.
Speech and language therapy is one of the most common treatment options available to treat children with autism. It helps the sufferers remove their fear of socializing and improve their overall communication skills so they are able to socialize and make a relationship with peers. Therefore, it is very important to start speech & language therapy as soon as a diagnosed is made with an online test for autism child.