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Find out why this slushy speech sound error is close to my heart, why it’s an important sound to work on, and learn some tips to help a child with a slushy “s” sound.

There’s also a short video and some freeeeee downloads too!

Tips for a slushy “s” sound

Growing up I had a slushy “s” sound…

I have memories of children at primary school making fun of the way that I spoke. It had a impact on my confidence, especially speaking in public. My parents were told that I wouldn’t qualify for Speech Therapy, that it probably wouldn’t help and that I’d likely just grow out of it. Luckily for me, my parents found a brilliant Speech Therapist who helped me to work on my “s” sound well as my speaking confidence.

Right now…

I probably have several children on my private Speech Therapy caseload with what you could describe as a slushy “s” sound. Some of my parents will have been told that their child would not qualify for Speech Therapy, and/or that Speech Therapy would not be able to help with this error. While it may be true that your local Speech and Language Therapy team may not provide direct intervention for this error alone…SPEECH THERAPY CAN HELP!

Why is it important to work on the “s” sound?

The “s” sound is one of the most common consonants used in spoken English. This means that a difficulty with the “s” sound can have a huge impact on the overall intelligibility of the speaker.

The use of a slushy “s” is not developmental in nature and so the child is UNLIKELY to “just grow out of it”.

Speech sound difficulties can have a huge impact on a child’s development and self esteem, especially as they become older and more aware of their own speech.

Early intervention is important, as the longer your child continues to use the incorrect motor pattern the more ingrained that motor pattern becomes. HOWEVER… intervention with older children who are motivated to make a change is also successful!

The Sound

HOW DO YOU MAKE THE “S” SOUND?

In a nutshell; you make the “s” sound by sending an airstream down the centre of your tongue. To do this you need to be able to “anchor” the sides of your tongue to your teeth whilst keeping the tip of your tongue at the front of your mouth close behind your front teeth.

We do all of this automatically without thinking - HOWEVER - trying to explain all of this to a little one is often just too much information! It’s too abstract, and doesn’t really help.

HOW IS THE SLUSHY SOUND MADE?

In Speech Therapy we call this slushy “s” sound a “lateral s” because, instead of sending the air stream down a central path along the tongue - the air is sent down the sides of the tongue (laterally). This is what causes the slushy sound.

If this is sounding all too familiar and you’d like to arrange a speech screen and/or online therapy for your child then please get in touch! We can arrange a quick chat first to talk about how it we can work together!

Let's arrange a quick chat!

What can you do to help?

Before we talk about how you can help, I should say that…like with many Speech Sound difficulties there is no “quick fix”. Learning and building up a new motor pattern is hard work. It takes time and lots of practice.

Firstly, stop calling it the “s” sound and call it something else instead! Because.. as soon as you call it the “s” sound the child will revert back to using the old familiar motor pattern; that slushy sound!

I usually start with a “t” sound, as you use a very similar tongue placement. I make sure the child can make a really great “t” sound and then go for multiple receptions; “t t t t t t t t t”.

Once we’ve practiced multiple repetitions of “t”, I’ll talk about stretching that last “t” sound out, making it a little bit longer. I’d model how to drag that sound out so we get something like this “t t t t t t t t ttssssss”.

This sound at the end then becomes their NEW sound. I usually call this the “flat tyre” sound. I do NOT call it the “s” sound. I have a picture of a flat tyre that I use as a visual prompt for this NEW sound.

From this point, it’s all about building up a new motor pattern for a new sound. Repetition is key. The more repetition the better.

Initially I start with repetition of the new sound on it’s own. Then, I usually pick a handful of target words and aim for at least 50 repetitions per session.

There is a short video demonstration that you can watch at end of the blog!

TARGET WORDS

For this specific approach I start by using a handful of target words that end in “ts”. For example; bats, cats, hats, boots, coats, lights.

You can use toys or pictures to prompt the child. If you use pictures there should be no written word, just the picture on it’s own.

You could use the flat tyre picture as a prompt for the child to use their new sound.

Don’t mention the “s” sound!

Watch the video it will help to explain!

Hopefully this is making sense to you. I’ve tried to summarise the approach in the short video below (it’s just over 5 minutes), so have a little watch and let me know what you think! The resources I use in the video are available as free downloads at the bottom of this blog!

Paper based resources are not for everyone, so please adapt this to suit the child you’re working with. Add toys, games and movement etc to meet the needs of the child you’re supporting!

Do you need some nice easy ideas to follow for helping a child with other speech sound difficulties? Have a look at my shop, the “Activities to help your child’s speech” pack is perfect for supporting natural speech sound development.

Keep scrolling to get your free downloads!

Speech Therapy can work for children with a slushy “s” sound and it can have a positive impact of their self esteem and confidence. If you’re reading this and you’d like more help for your child then get in touch to arrange a Speech Screen and some online Speech Therapy sessions.

If you’d like to know more about how we produce speech sounds, the ages and stages of speech sound development, speech sound patterns, how to screen the speech of young children AND how to support young children with unclear speech check out my Speech Sound Support Workshop.