son stuttering

LegacyUser

just looking for some advice please>

my six year old son has started stuttering intermittendly. he told me one of his school friends has also noticed this and asked him about it.

he had a similar issue before but after practising talking slowly and not trying to rush what he wanted to say i thought it had been resolved.

we have recently had a new baby but he already has siblings so dont think he is too traumatised by the new addition? however maybe im underestimating the impact of the new addition?

please help/any advise welcome.

op mammy

Roselm

op mammy wrote: »

just looking for some advice please>

my six year old son has started stuttering intermittendly. he told me one of his school friends has also noticed this and asked him about it.

he had a similar issue before but after practising talking slowly and not trying to rush what he wanted to say i thought it had been resolved.

we have recently had a new baby but he already has siblings so dont think he is too traumatised by the new addition? however maybe im underestimating the impact of the new addition?

please help/any advise welcome.

op mammy

Have you had him assessed by a speech therapist? If not you might be as well putting his name down on the list as the waiting lists can be long and it means the appointment is there in case the stutter doesn't resolve by itself.

Disruptions like that of a new baby can have an impact but not necessarily because the child sees it as a bad thing. Even positive stresses can have a big impact (birthdays, Christmas) as well as tiredness and a change in the routine.
As regards the friend. If your son brings it up again I would suggest talking to him about how everyone's speech gets bumpy sometimes (like when you're tired and trying to explain something complicated and you can't get it to come out right).

Hope that helps!

Ickle Magoo

Moved from PI - think you'll get more advice here, OP. :cool:

cynder

My boy stutters when he gets excited, getting him to calm down and talk slowly will help. If your are concerned get a referral to a speech therapist, (the waiting lists are long 1 year +)

eddison

Try the simple technique of getting him to take a deep breath every time he talks. Get him to use his whole breath on only a few words.
So one breath he could say for example- breath in then while breathing out- ''I am going'' but he must have used all his breath on this, then breath in again and exhale in one large breath ''to the shops''.
You may notice that those who stutter tend to not be breathing properly when they are stuttering. Hope this helps.

Roselm

eddison wrote: »

Try the simple technique of getting him to take a deep breath every time he talks. Get him to use his whole breath on only a few words.
So one breath he could say for example- breath in then while breathing out- ''I am going'' but he must have used all his breath on this, then breath in again and exhale in one large breath ''to the shops''.
You may notice that those who stutter tend to not be breathing properly when they are stuttering. Hope this helps.

This isn't recommended to be honest. It leaves the child VERY conscious of the whole thing. It'd be very stressful to have to breathe like that for every sentence and it certainly isn't natural.
Actually if you wanted some expert advice pronto the IASLT (Irish Association of Speech and Language Therapists) has a great little advice sheet that covers much of what a Speech Therapist would go through with you to begin with.

http://www.iaslt.ie/docs/news/IASLT%20Stammering%20Advice%20Sheet%20for%20Parents.pdf

If that link doesn't work just google IASLT stutter and it's the third option you get back (well it was for me). The advice sheet is called "Stammering. How parents can help"

Best of luck!

thesimpsons

i think its a fairly common thing, especially among boys from what I can gather from my son and various friend's kids. my fella did it about that age too. In his case, he was just trying to talk as quickly as his thoughts were coming through but the words wouldn't come out fast enough. We didn't make a big deal about it though as I could see it was only when he was excited about something, it never happened when he'd come seeking us out to tell us something random or normal. He grew out of it in a while. same story for some of our friends' kids. One thing we did do it teach him to deal with people asking him about it - he learned to say "some kids have blue/green eyes, some have black/fair, some wear glasses, this is me".

stovelid

Sorry to be slightly off-topic but at what age would parents here consider a child's occasional stuttering to require assessment?