What is Developmental Apraxia of Speech (DAS)?

DAS is a speech disorder that interferes with a child’s ability to correctly pronounce sounds, syllables, and words. It is the loss of ability to consistently position the articulators (face, tongue, lips, jaw) for the production of speech sounds and for sequencing these sounds. Non-speech activities are typically not affected (i.e. coughing, swallowing, chewing).

What are some of the main characteristics of DAS?

• Limited speech sound repertoire is frequently the main characteristic. There are very few speech sounds that the child can use automatically so he frequently uses a simple syllable (such as da) to stand for almost everything.
• Another characteristic of the DAS is inconsistency. A child with DAS is likely to have inconsistent speech errors and speech capability.
• A child with DAS may say short single words well, but as soon as he uses two or three words in a row, he drops all the ending sounds.
• The length of a phrase as an adverse effect on articulation. Generally, the longer the utterance, the worse the speech accuracy.
• Apraxic children are usually better at imitating speech than at saying words spontaneously.
• Anxiety may affect a child's ability to speak well. For all of us, performing is more difficult than talking.
• Children with DAS may also lose words. Parents frequently report that the child "used to say that, but doesn't anymore". This is another example of the motor plan for a word or phrase being unavailable to the child.

http://www.labmed.umn.edu/~john/apraxiarefs.html

http://www.apraxia-guide.com/

http://www.tayloredmktg.com/dyspraxia/das.html#what

What is an articulation problem?

A person has an articulation problem when he or she produces sounds, syllables or words incorrectly so that listeners do not understand what is being said or pay more attention to the way the words sound than to what they mean.  There are four main types of errors; substitutions, omissions, distortions, and additions.

Normal Articulation

The ages listed below are the ages at which 90% of children can say sounds appropriately:

At 32 months a child should have acquired /p/, /h/, /b/, /m/, /n/

At 36 months a child should have acquired /f/, /w/, /b/, /g/, /d/, and the "ng" sound.

At 48 months the child should have acquired /s/.

Articulation disorders are only considered a disorder when the sound being said incorrectly should have already been acquired.

What are developmental phonological disorders?

Phonological Processes are the systematic simplification by children of the production of adult-model articulation, such as deletion of the final consonant or syllables of words. A phonological disorder is an abnormal development of these processes or delay in the elimination of these processes. A developmental phonological disorders may occur in conjunction with other communication disorders such as apraxia of speech, stuttering, or various language impairments.

Phonological Development
THE GRADUAL ACQUISITION OF THE SPEECH SOUND SYSTEM
Copyright © 1999 Caroline Bowen

TABLE 3: Phonological processes are normally gone by these ages:

PHONOLOGICAL PROCESS	EXAMPLE	GONE BY APPROXIMATELY
Context sensitive voicing	pig = big	3;0
Word-final de-voicing	pig = pick	3;0
Final consonant deletion	comb = coe	3;3
Fronting	car = tar ship = sip	3;6
Consonant harmony	mine = mime kittycat = tittytat	3;9
Weak syllable deletion	elephant = efant potato = tato television =tevision banana = nana	4;0
Cluster reduction	spoon = poon train = chain clean = keen	4;0
Gliding of liquids	run = one leg = weg leg = yeg	5;0
Stopping /f/	fish = tish	3;0
Stopping /s/	soap = dope	3;0
Stopping /v/	very = berry	3;6
Stopping /z/	zoo = doo	3;6
Stopping 'sh'	shop = dop	4;6
Stopping 'j'	jump = dump	4;6
Stopping 'ch'	chair = tare	4;6
Stopping voiceless 'th'	thing = ting	5;0
Stopping voiced 'th'	them = dem	5;0

Questions and Answers about Phonological and Articulation Disorders

http://www.sd01.k12.id.us/schools/whitney/teachers/clousw/artic.htm

http://webpages.marshall.edu/~lynch4/articulation.html

http://members.tripod.com/Caroline_Bowen/phonol-and-artic.htm

http://www.kidsource.com/ASHA/articulation.html

What is Dysarthria?

Dysarthria is a motor speech disorder as a result of brain damage that may affect respiration, articulation, voice, and fluency.  Speech is slow, weak, imprecise or uncoordinated. ‘Childhood dysarthria’ is often a result of a disease or head injury.

http://etip.univnorthco.edu/COURSES/CMDS160/DysarthriaNotes.htm

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