As a parent, you want your child to thrive in every possible way. When it comes to speech development, you may have already considered speech therapy to help your child achieve their communication goals. Traditionally, speech therapy sessions took place in a clinic setting, requiring travel time and scheduling inconveniences. However, in-home speech therapy has become an increasingly popular option, and at Speech SF, this is all we do! In this post, we will discuss the benefits of in-home speech therapy compared to a clinic setting.
1. Time Saved
One significant advantage of in-home speech therapy is that it saves you time. With in-home sessions, you no longer need to account for travel time, parking, and the logistics of scheduling appointments with your child's other activities. For parents who have busy work schedules or multiple children, in-home therapy can be a real time-saver. You can easily fit the therapy sessions into your child's daily home routine without disrupting their schedule.
2. Direct Parent Coaching Time
Parents play an essential role in the progress of their child's speech therapy sessions. With in-home therapy, parents can have a more hands-on approach to their child's therapy. Our Speech Language Pathologists (SLPs) can coach parents during the session or in a separate meeting where they can learn how to target their child's communication goals effectively at home. We love to leave weekly practice ideas for our families to reinforce their child's progress between the speech visits. These consistent interactions keep everyone on the same page; and can result in quicker completion of their speech goals.
3. Being in their Natural Environment
Home is where the heart is, and for children in their developing years, it is where they feel the most comfortable. In our experience, in-home speech therapy sessions help the child feel safe, reducing the stress that they may feel from a clinical setting. With the trained SLP being present in a child's day-to-day environment, it's easier to facilitate conversations and activities that the child enjoys, making speech therapy more applicable and effective.
A typical session with Speech SF looks like...
A typical in-home speech therapy session starts with goal-targeting which looks like play from an observer's viewpoint. The SLP, having previously identified speech and language goals unique to the child, will use a variety of techniques and activities designed to stimulate the these. This may involve play-based activities, storytelling, or using objects and pictures to engage the child. The SLP skillfully guides these activities, increasing or decreasing support, to target specific speech sounds, words, or language concepts from their goals.
The session is not just child-focused, but also emphasizes parental involvement. Towards the end of the session, the SLP dedicates time for any questions that the parents might have. This allows parents to understand their child's progress, and learn strategies to reinforce the therapy goals during daily interactions with their child. The SLP might model specific interactions and provide feedback as the parents practice these interactions.
In-home speech therapy is not just about the therapy session itself - it extends beyond this, providing parents the tools to support their child's speech and language development after their session is over.
Carrying it over
In-home speech therapy allows both parents and children greater ease when it comes to therapy sessions. The advantages of in-home therapy are evident in the time savings, parent coaching, and the child feeling comfortable in their surroundings. If you're wondering whether in-home speech therapy is the best option for your child, it's worth considering to fit it into your family's busy lifestyle. When a child has the resources to overcome their speech obstacles, they can more easily connect with their family and succeed academically, which positively impacts their future.