LIPS by Lindamood

[PeterPan]

For y'all who have done this, did you really pay $450???  Is there a cheaper way to get this or a homeschooler discount or something?  

[OneStepAtATime]

My mom helped out and it cost us a combined price of $500, so I guess you are already getting a discount?  The price was awful but if we had hired a tutor trained in this system it would have cost a lot more since we would have been charged $50 an hour, twice a week for several months, (and that didn't include having to travel out of town for tutoring, which we would have).

 

 I know the sticker price is horrific, but If that is your best option it might be worth it.  If you aren't certain, then maybe there is an assessment you can give to try to confirm this is really going to help?  We used it based on what Susan Barton recommended on her site after my son didn't pass part C of the student screening she offers for free.  Have you done the tutor and student screenings off of the Barton site?  They are free and easy to do.  You aren't obligated to buy anything to do the screenings.  And Susan Barton was right.  LiPS really did help.  When I re-administered the screening test after LiPS his score went way up and he was finally able to pass the student screening and move on to do Barton.  He still trips up on some blended sounds upon occasion, but not like before.  When Mom's life isn't so crazy, we may have him do some of LiPS again to reinforce it but things really are moving much more smoothly after he did LiPS.

 

I know this is a tough decision and the cost is just sickening for all of these specialized programs...with no guarantees that they will work.  So sorry.  I wish I had a better answer.

[PeterPan]

Ding, good point!  It's been years since I looked at the Barton screening.  I looked at it back when dd was younger and I was making sure we had done everything we could for her.  I'll go look!  I remember it being buried (or else I have a furrball for a brain...) so don't expect to see me back for a while, lol.

[OneStepAtATime]

chuckle...understood...good luck!

[SwallowTail]

So, you can buy LipS?  Where can you do this?  I thought they only allowed their trained affiliates to use their program.  We have spent over $2000 getting LiPS through a speech therapist!  I would gladly purchase it (although we might be ready for bartyon now - I need to have dd take the evaluation test).

[OneStepAtATime]

So, you can buy LipS?  Where can you do this?  I thought they only allowed their trained affiliates to use their program.  We have spent over $2000 getting LiPS through a speech therapist!  I would gladly purchase it (although we might be ready for bartyon now - I need to have dd take the evaluation test).

Yes, you can buy it but only through Gander Publishing (I think that is the name).  You have to train on the system first but the training materials are included.  It is not as user friendly as Barton but if you just keep at it eventually everything makes more sense and becomes more automatic in your presentation.  

[Heathermomster]

My local dyslexia school offers a LIPs class to kindie aged children over the summer.

[OneStepAtATime]

My local dyslexia school offers a LIPs class to kindie aged children over the summer.

That's really nice!  Too bad it is only for much younger kids.  No one realized my son needed anything like that until 2nd grade...  Still, that is great that they would offer that!

[merry gardens]

For y'all who have done this, did you really pay $450???  Is there a cheaper way to get this or a homeschooler discount or something?  

I paid far less than that.  I bought the manual used from somewhere on the internet (ebay, I think?) I read and studied it before deciding what other components I wanted from the kit.  You don't need all of them--and many of what you do need could be created by an industrious homeschooler like yourself. If I remember, I bought he clings and some more of the lip pictures, plus the colored felts, and the training cd on vowels. 

 

They re-did the manual and the materials just a couple of years ago.  I haven't seen the new manual, but I can't imagine that they changed the vital information. If you can get an older edition used, that would save money.  They now also have some of the materials available on an electronic "LiPStick" (clever!) so you can print them off a computer, eliminating the need for some of the kit components I bought. 

[LaughingCat]

I did not buy the whole kit.  I bought the extra DVD's used (thinking I could sell them again for aprox the same amount) and then bought the main manual only.  I made my own (magnetic) tiles.

[LaughingCat]

Darn, the dreaded "double post"

[Lecka]

My oldest son did an equivalent (multisensory, pictures of mouth shapes) in speech therapy. Insurance paid it all.

 

They told me it would usually take 6 weeks to 3 months, 2 hours/week, but it took him about 10 months and we cut his time down of 90 minutes a week.

 

For lips though I am confident I have read of someone using just the manual and making their own materials.

 

My son had a ton of picture cards and they just drew him pictures of his mouth shapes. He only did it for the sounds he was in speech for, he didn't need it for every sound.

 

I would talk to your speech therapist. It might be something she can address or print out materials for you. It is also something where she might have an opinion about when to use it.

 

I would want to use it as review only or else cover sounds at the same time as the speech therapist. I would not want to go ahead of the speech therapist, unless she thinks it is fine.

 

If you are still working with a speech therapist you like.

 

My son went into this with an articulation level of 2 years 11 months -- I wouldn't be concerned if someone's articulation level was a lot better. My son was pretty lost though.

[LaughingCat]

I wanted to add that I bought the extra dvd's first.  I had been waffling about LIPs for a long time, and couldn't seem to get a handle on what it was about/how it worked.  When I saw the DVD's for sale used, I figured I could buy them, get a clue, and then sell them with little to no loss if it didn't seem useful. However, the Manual actually comes with 2 DVD's, so I believe I could have done the whole thing with just Manual, the DVD's it came with and home made materials.  And, you can buy many of the Lindamood products on Amazon.  The LIPs products are cheaper on Gander right now, but I bought the Visualizing and Verbalizing manual on Amazon (brand new) for less than Gander.

 

Also, I can see how you could use parts of it or something like it for speech (as Lecka's SLP did) but the LIPS program is meant to teach reading not  speech.  The lip/tongue/breath movements are taught in order to create awareness of phonemes within a word (whereas speech would be about using the movements to be able to say the word ).

 

Once you learn the lip/tongue/breath of all the sounds, the program moves to listening to the word, breaking up words into their sounds, and phoneme deletion/addition/substitutions using that knowledge   Then it moves to harder and harder words, and moves into syllables, phoneme deletion/addition/substitution within one syllable of a longer word (and into various common but odd endings like tion/sion/cion).

 

Now,  it did help my DD's ability to say certain words that she mangled previously - but I no longer believe that was a standard speech issue anyway (and our SLP never found a commonality speech-wise in the words either).

 

 

 

 

[OneStepAtATime]

I would like to reiterate for anyone reading this that doesn't know much about this system that LiPS really isn't for speech therapy, as other posters have also mentioned, although it has aspects of that.  While kids who have speech issues, too, along with reading issues, could probably use this along with speech therapy quite successfully, I would think you would want to use it for improving reading primarily, not speech (although I am not trained in that field and may be wrong).  

 

With my own son, speech was not the real issue at all, actually.  Many people use LiPS with kids that have reading issues AND speech issues so we were under the impression it was really more of a speech program.  If it weren't for Susan Barton, we would have completely overlooked LiPS and yet LiPS is exactly what my son needed.

 

My son had a very advanced vocabulary and was easily understood at an early age.  He spoke full, complex sentences at 18 months.  We knew that sometimes certain blends came out a bit odd, and when he repeated words back, once in a while he would get a sound incorrect or a blend might be flipped, but he was so young we didn't worry.  By 2nd grade those blend oddities were sounding a little more unusual since we had expected him to grow out of them, but it didn't prevent anyone from understanding him.  He was quite articulate.  

 

When I administered the Barton student screening, I really didn't think either child would have any issues.  My daughter breezed through just fine.  My son did not.  Section C just was not working for him at all.  It caught what no assessor or his pediatrician had.  Starting him on LiPS not only helped him with the blended sounds issue, we found he also had a bit of difficulty in other areas that had been affecting his reading ability (i,e; o,u; s,th confusion for example) but because of his areas of strength he had been subtly compensating all these years and none of these issues were readily apparent.  As he got older it was becoming harder and harder for him to compensate for the deficits but we didn't know the root cause of those difficulties. Barton's screening showed us where a lot of the disconnect was and LiPS has turned most of those issues completely around.  If we ever have time to go back and do parts of it again to solidify the couple of areas that still cause some issues (especially when he is tired or frustrated), I really think the rest will smooth out as well.  

 

Sorry, not sure any of that was really useful.  Hope everyone is well.  Good luck, OhElizabeth!  Wishing you and your family the very best.

[Lecka]

That is true.  

 

When I have looked into information about Lips, I am only focusing on the part of the program that is pertinent to my son.  

 

I (basically) moved on to (other) reading programs as soon as he could match his speech and speech sounds, and identify and separate all the speech sounds.  

 

In the Super Duper catalogue, in the past they have listed Lips in the Articulation section.  I think it may be mainly the earlier part of the program that would be used.

 

[PeterPan]

...

Once you learn the lip/tongue/breath of all the sounds, the program moves to listening to the word, breaking up words into their sounds, and phoneme deletion/addition/substitutions using that knowledge   Then it moves to harder and harder words, and moves into syllables, phoneme deletion/addition/substitution within one syllable of a longer word (and into various common but odd endings like tion/sion/cion).

 

Now,  it did help my DD's ability to say certain words that she mangled previously - but I no longer believe that was a standard speech issue anyway (and our SLP never found a commonality speech-wise in the words either).

 

 

I would like to reiterate for anyone reading this that doesn't know much about this system that LiPS really isn't for speech therapy...

Thanks ladies, I really had to slow down today and figure out why Laughing Cat was recommending this.  I agree I had a misconception about the point of the program and thought it was for speech.  I realized I was on the receiving end of some "we can see this and you're just not seeing it yet" advice...  ;)  So thanks, I see it now.  Then, like you laughing cat, I wondered if maybe it was more of a teaching end on my part, this or that and wanted to waffle.  It's not; clearly he's not breaking things down.  I've had the games and programs to do this stuff with him at a more typical level.  I came on saying it wasn't clicking and that I needed something more detailed and y'all gave it to me.  

 

So yes, I working on getting a copy.  I'm asking around and seeing what will turn up.  My really lazy, tired side wants to just buy a kit and be done with it.  If I'm wrong and he doesn't need it, I'll use and sell.  If he needs it, then this is cover your butt, take the plunge, get it done.  The one thing I'm a little uncertain on is her PAS readers.  I'm so steeped in the SWR methodology with whole words that you gulp that it's sort of scary to me.  Dd never sounded out.  Seriously.  She wouldn't/couldn't, bucked it like crazy, and only did it a tad if forced.  So I don't mean to walk into dyslexia heresy, but I sort of don't want to teach bad habits if they're not necessary, kwim?  Yes, I just called sounding out a bad habit, sorry. It's just one of those internal debates I haven't sorted out.  I know what worked for dd and I don't know what ds will need.  Feel free to enlighten me.  :)

 

I'll tell you though, I hunted all over and couldn't find the Barton pre-test.  I remember having trouble years ago and finding it only by chance.  Where in the world is it on the current site?  Linkie please?   :p 

 

 And yes, we've had others say that working on reading helped speech.  I definitely think it would be good for my ds, because it would give him more ways to slow down and think about what he's supposed to be saying.  Right now he only hears it.  He's fine on short words, but these longer words with lots of sounds and syllables get really crunchy.  There's just a lot that has to happen there, knowing the word, remembering all the sounds and syllables, stringing all those together and motor planning it all.  That's a lot!  Of course, duh, he's not even close to reading words like "partially" or "especially" anyway.   :w00t:

[OneStepAtATime]

http://www.bartonreading.com/  On the main page put your mouse over "tutor" from the list of options on the left-hand side to find the tutor screening (unless you already did this in the past, you need to pass the tutor screening before you can give the student screening).  In the drop down menu that comes up, select the tutor screening option and do that first (make certain you have about half an hour without interruptions to get set up, administer it to yourself, etc.)  If you pass the tutor screening, or you have already taken it and don't need to do it, from that main page, put your mouse over "Student" and select student screening from the drop down menu.  You might want to watch the whole thing first, before you try doing anything with your child.  One thing I found did NOT work with my kids was the structure of having them do a small segment, leave the room while I set up the next segment and record the previous results then come in and do another segment.  They hated leaving, coming back, leaving again, because they would just get started doing something else and have to put it down.  I went ahead and ignored that recommendation and just plowed right on through, but without watching it ahead of time this might be difficult.   Gotta go.  I have some additional thoughts but will have to post more tomorrow.  Nite!

[PeterPan]

Ok, hallelujah, I think I found the screening tool for Barton!!!!

 

http://www.bartonreading.com/students_long.html#screen

[OneStepAtATime]

Yeah!!!!

[Lecka]

(If he is like my son he might be many months away from using the readers. I think he could benefit greatly from the earlier parts, and have it be worth the money, and never use them. THAT is how good I think the early parts are. Maybe he will breeze on through but I would not expect it if he is not even hearing final consonants. I think that is going to take some time. I do think this or equivalent speech therapy is So Good for hearing speech sounds.)

 

(Disregard if he aces the Barton screening!!!!!!!)

 

(It is just.... He has to hear them AND tell them apart.)

 

If it is available at the library, I got some useful information from Phonics A-Z by Wiley Blevins. It is not worth buying, but worth reading.

 

He refers to Lips by its old name, ADD auditory discrimination in depth. He has a couple of pages about it. He talks about when he would want students to use it, from the perspective of a reading specialist. Iirc he wants kids to learn speech sounds and then he can pick up after that. Iirc he wants a speech therapist to do the speech sounds part and then he can start the kids in phonemic awareness (kind-of like Barton).

[Lecka]

Separately -- here is the explanation I would give for your daughter. From my sounding-out worldview.

 

She memorized some words. She noticed what sounds went with some letters. She guessed at some words from context and filled in the letters she knew over time. She taught herself how to read. She did it quickly and with good guessing, and so it appears she always read whole words.

 

But I would say, she taught herself phonics as she read her memorized words and came to new words. She is still reading with phonics, she just did well with internalizing the rules on her own.

 

I have read estimates that 30% of children learn to read this way with no ill effect at all.

 

It is totally legitimate, but for the percent of kids who do not have a foundation to teach themselves and internalize it themselves, it is not going to necessarily happen.

 

Really -- how do you explain her reading an unknown word that is not clear from context. How do you explain her reading place names or character names that are new to her. There is no other way to read some words. Of course she probably has fluent recognition of syllables now and can sound out extremely quickly and fluidly. But it is still sounding out.

 

It is something to think about.

 

Just ignore the negative comments about vision therapy. They are not helpful.

[LaughingCat]

I agree with Lecka here as well - I don't think their readers are special to the program (as compared to any other good readers).  I think the "special" part of the program is LIPS method of teaching the child to pull apart words into their sounds using their own mouth/lips/tongue/breath as they are saying the words and also using that to identify if they are saying the wrong sound  (this may be what I was missing below).

 

<CROSS POST PORTION from related Kinesthetic thread>

once they get out of the sounds part, on the videos its all just using squares to do syllable/phoneme identification/substitution/additions/deletions.    This is why Barton says to jump to Barton at that point (Level 1 being basically a similar type of tile work).   In the LIPs videos, they do continue to talk about the names for the sounds (lip popper etc) during all this part, but not nearly as much (and you could certainly do that with another program as well).    When I did LIPs with DD I did not jump to generic tiles like they did, I just kept having her using the magnetic mouth tiles I had made, to keep her focus on paying attention to her mouth to feel what sounds were in the word - because that is the part of the program she needed work on (heck, we had done plenty of stuff like the later part already - and she still couldn't do it correctly consistently or quickly ).

 

Simply put, the first part of LIPs teaches a kinesthetic method (your mouth/lips/tongue/breath that you are using as you say the word) to pull apart a word into it's different sounds. (ETA - as part of this it also teaches them to identify when they are saying the wrong sound - and can be used when reading to point out the wrong sound they are saying and the right sound they need to be saying)

 

FYI, I don't really like the above simple description, because to me it would not have sounded like something DD really needed.  And she did need it - LIPs is one of a very few programs that DD had quick, obvious improvement from.  (ETA - my point above that is also teaches them to identify when they are saying the wrong sound might be the missing piece of that definition)

[merry gardens]

...  I'm so steeped in the SWR methodology with whole words that you gulp that it's sort of scary to me.  Dd never sounded out.  Seriously.  She wouldn't/couldn't, bucked it like crazy, and only did it a tad if forced.  So I don't mean to walk into dyslexia heresy, but I sort of don't want to teach bad habits if they're not necessary, kwim?  Yes, I just called sounding out a bad habit, sorry. It's just one of those internal debates I haven't sorted out.  I know what worked for dd and I don't know what ds will need.  Feel free to enlighten me.   :)...

If one can only sound out words, that person's reading will lack fluency.  Sounding out is only a "bad habit" (as you call it) if the child can never get past it.  Good readers eventually read words by sight. Some dyslexic children may need to see a word hundreds and hundreds of times before they ever recognize the word just by sight.  In the meantime, they are so busy sounding out individuals words with their individual sounds, that they forget what they just read.  Nancy Bell, the co-founder of Lindamood-Bell, developed Seeing Stars to address the issue of fluency.  She also developed Visualizing and Verbalizing because sometimes even fluency isn't enough for reading comprehension. So even one of the founders of Lindamood-Bell doesn't see LiPS and phonics as the answer to every reading problem.

 

LiPS program sets LMB apart from other reading programs because LiPS teaches some foundational skills that most people just "have" without really having to even think about or work at learning them.  Those unfortunate souls who lack those skills will find reading phonetically very difficult, at least until they acquire them.

 

If someone has a strong enough sight memory for words, she may get by simply from memorizing words.  If she can memorize enough words her underlying problems may go undetected for a long time, and it might eventually be corrected by all the reading and spelling--or it might not ever be corrected but still never show up as a problem unless someone goes looking for it.  (That's why Barton has a screen for tutors too; just because someone reads doesn't necessarily mean they can hear the sounds in words and read phonetically.)

 

Barton addresses phonemic awareness that many struggling readers lack, but some dyslexic children don't even have enough to start Barton. That's why my son was referred to LiPS.  Passing the Barton screen doesn't necessarily mean a struggling reader wouldn't benefit from LiPS, it just means they have enough to start Barton.  The first few levels of Barton teaches what later portions of LiPS covers, (Seeing Stars overlaps some with LiPS too.)  

 

If a person lacks these foundational skills, teaching a child to read phonetically will be very painful--if not impossible--until the child can distinguish one sound from another and recognize the smaller sounds within words. So, with your daughter's history of problems with phonics and your son's history of speech problems, I think you are smart to be asking these questions. (But I already thought you were smart.) 

[OneStepAtATime]

Agree with Merry gardens.  I know that if you have seen success with whole word learning, it would seem counter productive to go back to sounding out.  I thought it was, too and for some kids it probably is.  I don't know about your child.  I can only go by what I have seen with my kids and my relatives who have reading issues.  My kids hated sounding out, too. Why?  Because this was not a skill that was processing efficiently in their brains or came naturally at all.  They were learning to read through whole word at school but it wasn't efficient either and could be quite painful at times.  My son, especially, was compensating, but they both were missing the most basic components of learning to read, the sounds involved with each letter and how those sounds go together to form words.  They could "read" but they couldn't "read", and learning to recognize each individual word, be able to read it fluently, decode it quickly etc. was taking an enormous amount of time and effort and they were NOT learning the way their brain needed to learn to read.  They were both very articulate so sound association was not something ANYONE thought might be an issue and yet that is exactly what a large part of the problem really was.

 

Barton is not for every dyslexic and OG instruction is not necessary for every child learning to read.  I learned through whole word recognition and was reading voraciously at an early age.  However, having now done the early levels of Barton, things that I was grasping subconsciously I now finally UNDERSTAND.  I actually wish someone had done this for me when I was younger, although I almost certainly could have moved through it much faster than my kids are since I am not dyslexic.  

 

When I started Level 1 of Barton, I will admit i was disappointed and thought we had wasted our money.  It seemed SO basic and almost silly going back to just sounds, not even sound letter association, especially for my older child who was already in 6th grade at that point.  However, once we started and I committed to following the recommendations and script, changes began pretty quickly.  Over the past year I have watched the transformation in understanding of sounds and words and language with my kids and it has been amazing.  

 

Are they reading at grade level fluently and easily yet?  Nope.  But we are a LOT closer than we were.  The areas we have already covered are now finally coming fluently and when they do stumble they have processes in place to get through a lot of it for both spelling and reading without needing my help.  They are far more confident and finally understand WHY sometimes the boring systematic approach is the right way to go.

 

Do I think Barton is for everyone?  No.  Every child is different, every situation is different and one size does not fit all.  But what I have learned over and over while homeschooling my kids with learning differences is that sometimes going way, way back to the very, very basics is the best way to finally fix all the little pieces that have never truly come together smoothly.  It has worked amazingly well with reading, spelling, grammar, and (thanks to recommendations from so many wonderful people here at the Hive) finally Math as well.  

 

Barton, and other programs like hers, don't just teach sounding out expecting that to be the way to learn to read.  They teach sounding out in a systematic, structured approach that goes way back to the very basics of learning sounds and associating letters with sounds because, for many, that process is NOT automatic, is NOT comfortable or easy, when applied to reading, but with explicit, careful, systematic instruction It CAN become automatic for many who have reading process differences.  LiPS just takes that process even further back than Barton, for those that need it.  

 

Both of my kids were always articulate.  It never occurred to me that sound association was part of the issue with reading (especially with my son).  Turns out that was a huge part of the issue.  For them, whole language recognition was the far more inefficient path to take, even though they were more comfortable trying to read that way than sounding out....Now, they have the scaffolding in place to sound out correctly when necessary but are also able to read the words in areas they have already been taught, and read them fluently.

 

Is Barton, or another program like it, what you need?  Maybe, maybe not.  Is LiPS what you need even before Barton, or in place of Barton?  Maybe, maybe not.  I just know that I had a lot of misunderstanding about both of those programs before using them, and even right after we started using them.  After using them, though, I found that they were EXTREMELY helpful for our situation and continue to be so.  I hope you find what works for yours.  Big hugs of support!  

[LaughingCat]

<cross posting this portion of my post from Kinesthetic thread - because it's really more relevant to this thread - and one of the things I really struggled with when deciding to buy LIPS was trying to understand it better >

 

LIPS focus is on differentiating the different parts of a heard or read word.  It associates the sounds to letters and has clear references to letters/reading/spelling from the beginning.  And it has two tracks: one in which you learn all the letters/sounds & lip/tongue/breath correlations first (this is what we did and is the straight through the manual track), and one in which you only learn a few and then immediately jump into reading/spelling.     And there is a lot of similarity to Barton Level 1 (which is more scripted and slower but of course no lip/tongue/breath correlations).

 

[PeterPan]

Well y'all will rejoice to know I won a copy of LIPS on ebay along with the mouth cards, syllable cards, and the 64 deck, so I'm on my way!   :thumbup: 

 

What you all explained makes a lot of sense.  Lecka, that was a fascinating take on dd's reading experience and I hadn't thought of it that way.  Laughing Cat, I appreciate your push and your work on clarifying in my mind what it does, because without that I don't think I would have gotten it.  OneStep, your explanation of why Barton does sounding out is helpful, thanks.  I'll probably have to review that a few times as we get through the first steps and see where we need to go next...

 

Merry, thanks, it was good to be called smart and reinforced on a night when you wonder, lol.  I'm getting flack from people on both sides seems like, with some people saying it's jumping the gun if he's only 5 and others saying of course you intervene.  I think with some common sense I can TRY it with him and that LIPS is not going to hurt him, not done gentle and observantly.  

 

So thanks ladies!  The LIPS stuff should be on its way and be here by some time next week, I would think.  Then I'll be able to settle in and start learning!  Guess that puts us starting the week after Thanksgiving.  Does anyone have any opinions on the letter tiles?  Anything else that didn't come in that list I gave above that I'll want?  I have AAS tiles, so I could use those for the letters.  Or would it be better to buy the ones from Gander?  Doesn't matter?  And do the colored tiles matter or should I just make do?  Anything else?  

 

[Heathermomster]

LIPS training and the RB work are perfect for DS, and he's the ideal age for both. I'm glad you worked it out. Good job Mom!!!

[PeterPan]

LIPS training and the RB work are perfect for DS, and he's the ideal age for both. I'm glad you worked it out. Good job Mom!!!

Oh my goodness, you don't know how this fascinates me to hear this!  See I've got people, ahem, telling me (not here, other places) that he's only K4, you worry too much, blah blah.  However the same thing could have been said about his speech when he was not yet 2 and I was pursuing evals...  You know I hadn't even thought about it that way.  I was so confident about the speech thing, I spat on them and did it anyway, not even paying the naysayers a lick of mind.  I guess you're right, that that's what I need to do here.  

 

Everybody has an opinion on whether something is within the realm of normal for your kid, your family's genes, whatever.  Some of this stuff with phonemic awareness is less clear to me, like what would be the norm with a NT dc of the same age.  Would a newly 5 yo do well on the Barton pre-test?  If the average NT newly 5 yo would be fine with it, even through section C, then yes I should be plunging forward.  Maybe I could call Barton today and just chat with her about it?  Hmm...  I've never called or bothered her, but I've heard she takes questions.

[LaughingCat]

DD ^{the younger}  (4 3/4) has developmentally appropriate speech issues, where she cannot pronounce various blends(st,pl,gr,sh,ch,th type thing)* - however she is (and has been since 3)  aware of those sounds and will correct you ("no,no") if you say the word back the way she does.    DD^{the older} did not differentiate like that at 5 or even older  - if you repeated back what you thought she said, even though it seemed like gobbledygook, she would say "yes".  ETA:  DD^{the older}  would say "yes" if you said the word correctly and no to an incorrect word - she knew what she was trying to say but she couldn't differentiate between her garbled word and the correct word.

 

I think I will give DD^{the younger} the Barton tests C and see what happens.

 

*she is getting to the top edge of developmentally appropriate for st,pl,gr - but she is also on the edge of being able to say them and is actively trying to do it - all on her own with no pushing (she will say stuff like "s" "t" "op", "s""t" "op" - trying to put the sounds together)

 

[PeterPan]

Ooo, that would be fabulous!  I'll wait to hear your results!!!   :D

 

Btw, I had no clue kids would try to do gluing and ungluing words on their own.  Wowsers.

[OneStepAtATime]

Oh my goodness, you don't know how this fascinates me to hear this!  See I've got people, ahem, telling me (not here, other places) that he's only K4, you worry too much, blah blah.  However the same thing could have been said about his speech when he was not yet 2 and I was pursuing evals...  You know I hadn't even thought about it that way.  I was so confident about the speech thing, I spat on them and did it anyway, not even paying the naysayers a lick of mind.  I guess you're right, that that's what I need to do here.  

 

Everybody has an opinion on whether something is within the realm of normal for your kid, your family's genes, whatever.  Some of this stuff with phonemic awareness is less clear to me, like what would be the norm with a NT dc of the same age.  Would a newly 5 yo do well on the Barton pre-test?  If the average NT newly 5 yo would be fine with it, even through section C, then yes I should be plunging forward.  Maybe I could call Barton today and just chat with her about it?  Hmm...  I've never called or bothered her, but I've heard she takes questions.

I have exchanged emails with Susan Barton and found her very helpful and quite kind.  I know that she also was very helpful with someone else who was trying to implement Barton in a school to help her children.  Others have said they didn't find her as friendly.  I guess it depends on the personality and maybe the specific discussion?

[LaughingCat]

Just wanted to add, because I realized my note at the end made it sound like DD^{the younger} might be playing with words in a word blending for reading kind of way - she does not "get" that type of blending/unblending yet.  The only blending she does is specifically for the sounds she can't quite say yet.    So, she is aware that we are saying "st" and she is saying "t" only and she figured out that she needs to put "s" and "t" together somehow to make the sound we are making, and she is attempting to do that.   But she doesn't pull apart the rest of the word into it's parts (she has also played with saying "s<end>" instead of her normal "t<end> - but still just the sound she knows she's saying differently).

 

But I think her awareness of the difference between what she is saying and what we are saying is indicative of phoneme awareness that my older DD didn't have. 

 

[myboyluvsdinos]

 

Everybody has an opinion on whether something is within the realm of normal for your kid, your family's genes, whatever.  Some of this stuff with phonemic awareness is less clear to me, like what would be the norm with a NT dc of the same age.  Would a newly 5 yo do well on the Barton pre-test?  If the average NT newly 5 yo would be fine with it, even through section C, then yes I should be plunging forward.  Maybe I could call Barton today and just chat with her about it?  Hmm...  I've never called or bothered her, but I've heard she takes questions.

 

Just saw this thread. I would encourage you to call her. I think she typically says a child needs to be at least 5 and half-way through kindergarten before starting the program. I'm not sure what she would say about the screening with him just turning 5. Please keep in mind (not just you, but others who read these boards) that the screening simply tells you whether a child is ready for the Barton program. You can't take the screening and decide, based on the results, whether your child is dyslexic. I just wanted to add that because sometimes it seems like people might be thinking that (again, not you, but others on these boards who may be reading this).

 

Also regarding the whole word vs. sounding out debate. My opinion is that if your child can read a complex word without any clues whatsoever, then don't sweat it. The problem is, people think they don't have clues, but they often do. The only way to really test this is to put a very random word (nonsense words are the true test) on a single blank piece of paper and have them read it. Something like "economics." If they get it right, great. A lot of dyslexics will say things like "economy" because they are guessing at parts of the word. Same with "communities." They might say "community" or "countries" because the words start with the same letters, have a lot of the same letters, etc.

 

And while I'm at it, I hear lots of folks say their child can read fine, but when they listen to them read aloud, it's choppy, slow, they leave off suffixes, miss words, and generally get words wrong. My guess is that these kids are testing ok on comprehension, which is why their parent thinks they can read ok. But really, that oral reading is key to truly understanding if your child can read well. Many, if not most, dyslexics can test ok on comprehension because they are smart and very adept at using all sorts of clues to figure out the meaning of the passage. I just mention this because poor out-loud reading should be a very big red flag that a child is not truly reading well, even though they may be able to comprehend what they read. Later on in their education, when they are reading very complex words with far fewer clues, they will likely start suffering the consequences of this type of "reading."

 

And if your child is one of these poor "out-loud readers" (again, not you OhE, but people on these boards), I would advise you to limit the times you have them read aloud to you until you have found a good program for remediation. I say this because if you force them to read and they are not very good at it and don't have the tools to decode, you also force them to guess at words, which is a very bad habit and extremely hard to break. Wait until they are solid on skills (using a quality program) and then let them read out loud to you.

 

Good luck! :)

[Lecka]

Laughing Cat -- that entire post you wrote also describes a speech intervention.

 

To some extent my son said words incorrectly because he heard them incorrectly.

 

It is a skill needed for speech and reading both.

 

My son couldn't even learn all his letters before.

 

If a child having this intervention is about 5 or 6 then it is age-appropriate to include reading at the same time. Plus it helps kids with their speech! Plus the kids with this problem are probably needing help in reading!!!

 

I think at this level speech and reading are pretty similar, though. I read that phonemic awareness is needed for reading only, not needed for spoken language. Phonological awareness is needed for reading and spoken language.

 

My son could hear v and th and f separately, while he couldn't say th. All his others were not discriminating sounds. You have to check each minimal pair you are concerned about separately, imo.

 

We are checking with my younger son, and it looks like he can hear all his single consonants fine, in any position in a cvc word. Blends maybe not so much, but he is young, too.

[PeterPan]

Just saw this thread. I would encourage you to call her. I think she typically says a child needs to be at least 5 and half-way through kindergarten before starting the program. I'm not sure what she would say about the screening with him just turning 5. Please keep in mind (not just you, but others who read these boards) that the screening simply tells you whether a child is ready for the Barton program. You can't take the screening and decide, based on the results, whether your child is dyslexic. I just wanted to add that because sometimes it seems like people might be thinking that (again, not you, but others on these boards who may be reading this).

 

Also regarding the whole word vs. sounding out debate. My opinion is that if your child can read a complex word without any clues whatsoever, then don't sweat it. The problem is, people think they don't have clues, but they often do. The only way to really test this is to put a very random word (nonsense words are the true test) on a single blank piece of paper and have them read it. Something like "economics." If they get it right, great. A lot of dyslexics will say things like "economy" because they are guessing at parts of the word. Same with "communities." They might say "community" or "countries" because the words start with the same letters, have a lot of the same letters, etc.

 

And while I'm at it, I hear lots of folks say their child can read fine, but when they listen to them read aloud, it's choppy, slow, they leave off suffixes, miss words, and generally get words wrong. My guess is that these kids are testing ok on comprehension, which is why their parent thinks they can read ok. But really, that oral reading is key to truly understanding if your child can read well. Many, if not most, dyslexics can test ok on comprehension because they are smart and very adept at using all sorts of clues to figure out the meaning of the passage. I just mention this because poor out-loud reading should be a very big red flag that a child is not truly reading well, even though they may be able to comprehend what they read. Later on in their education, when they are reading very complex words with far fewer clues, they will likely start suffering the consequences of this type of "reading."

 

And if your child is one of these poor "out-loud readers" (again, not you OhE, but people on these boards), I would advise you to limit the times you have them read aloud to you until you have found a good program for remediation. I say this because if you force them to read and they are not very good at it and don't have the tools to decode, you also force them to guess at words, which is a very bad habit and extremely hard to break. Wait until they are solid on skills (using a quality program) and then let them read out loud to you.

 

Good luck! :)

Hi, thanks for replying!  That gave me a lot more to chew on! 

 

Ok, I'm back!!  I was just about to write here and say I had missed the window to call her, and then I realized with the time difference I still could!  So I called her, and wow that was awesome!!!!!!!!!!!  She said yes, a NT 5 yo would be able to do section C of the pre-test (and sections A and B) with NO, absolutely no issues.  She said that when they do section C, they're looking at three things:

 

-sequencing

-auditory memory (not auditory WORKING memory but just auditory memory, as we are not manipulating the data in any way)

-and significant trouble with auditory discrimination

 

She said LIPS works on all three of those things, and that if the dc has issues with the first two and not the third they should still go through LIPS.  

 

Other fascinating things?  She said LIPS is not easy for a parent to pick up and use and to hire a tutor if we have any struggles or aren't getting results.  She said to do the Barton screening tool AGAIN after we do LIPS, to make sure it all stuck and gelled. 

 

Now for something fascinating.  She said there are some alternate intelligence tests that are non-verbal for situations where the kids have language issues and that I might be very wise to go ahead and check into some evals.  But she said to try to find someone who actually has a lot of EXPERIENCE with dyslexia and apraxia.  She said they might turn up some other areas to work on that we aren't realizing.  Just her comment about the sequencing made me realize how right she was.  There are all kinds of nuances there, and early is better than later.

 

Now about the developmental thing.  She said that she has people who test and the kid fails section C at 5, but they say oh he's only 5, I'll wait till 6.  Then he fails at 6 and they go oh but I still don't want to pay so much, and they wait till 7...  So she said it's not going away, this is the right age to intervene, it's not jumping the gun, a NT 5 yo would have flown through the screening.

 

So that's a lot to take in, wowsers!  I think I just saw $1500 fly out the door, ugh.  Don't tell dh, and I won't.  I need time to work on the psych thing anyway, to see who would be good for that.  She advised finding somebody VERY experienced, not just run of the mill.

 

So thanks for the push to call her.  

 

Btw, she reiterated your comment, that the screening tool is not a dyslexia diagnosis.  She said there could be a variety of reasons, blah blah. She said sometimes the cause will be the verbal apraxia WITHOUT any dyslexia. But the point was it still needed to be worked on.  That's why she advised further evals, to make sure you're actually targeting and not just guessing.  Lots to take in.  And she DEFINITELY thought we should be doing LIPS.  She said most psychs would not want to eval for dyslexia till they've *at least* done half of K5, which is what I think you said.  In our case though she was saying evals before that might help us target things that are caused by the apraxia and aren't so much dyslexia, meaning go earlier and don't wait.  So there you go, a fascinating conversation.

 

Well now I'm worn out!  I wrote Lecka's response below before the phone call.  Whew!  What a whirlwind!  Confirmation we're on the right track, horror that I almost somehow missed it had it not been for y'all somehow reading between the lines on my odd posts.  And yes, she said unless you have a background in ST, LIPS is actually kind of hard to implement on your own.  Enough of that.  I'm going to go let the dust settle on this whirlwind!

 

Laughing Cat -- that entire post you wrote also describes a speech intervention.

 

To some extent my son said words incorrectly because he heard them incorrectly.

 

It is a skill needed for speech and reading both.

 

My son couldn't even learn all his letters before.

 

If a child having this intervention is about 5 or 6 then it is age-appropriate to include reading at the same time. Plus it helps kids with their speech! Plus the kids with this problem are probably needing help in reading!!!

 

I think at this level speech and reading are pretty similar, though. I read that phonemic awareness is needed for reading only, not needed for spoken language. Phonological awareness is needed for reading and spoken language.

 

My son could hear v and th and f separately, while he couldn't say th. All his others were not discriminating sounds. You have to check each minimal pair you are concerned about separately, imo.

 

We are checking with my younger son, and it looks like he can hear all his single consonants fine, in any position in a cvc word. Blends maybe not so much, but he is young, too.

Ok, can I say I just had a lightbulb moment and want to write this down before I forget?  With my ds, improving his ability to say the phonograms (and the work that entails) improves his ability to distinguish them.

 

There, got that out before I lost it!  Like Lecka, I've seen a relationship between what ds can *say* and what he can *distinguish* auditorally. So for instance, before he could say /s/ and /sh/ accurately in his speech, he could not distinguish them in minimal difference pairs.  Working on the phonemic awareness and hearing it didn't improve his speech, because his was a motor control issue; we actually had to sit down and give the sensory input.  But once he could make both accurately, he also quickly became able to DISTINGUISH them in speech.

 

So the speech and auditory discrimination are definitely connected.  I think syllables we work on sort of naturally when we slow down a word for them to repeat.  Boom, got that skill.  But things like ungluing words or gluing, I'm not sure about a natural counterpart.  In our ST we've always done words at normal/natural speed, full pace.  We NEVER slow down words for ST purposes, because to do so would be to teach the motor control pattern as slowed down.  Then you'd have to reteach it faster, oops.  So we're always careful to say the word exactly as we want it to end up sounding.  The only time I break that rule is when I have a long multi-syllable word.  For instance today he was going around singing that he was a Wampanoag (the tribe of indians where the Pilgrims landed).  That's a long word, so the first time I have him repeat it I slow it down to syllables to make sure he gets it.  Even then it's not super-slow, just a fuzz slow and sort of even all over, basically the pace I want him to say the complex word.

 

Where was this going?  LOL, I'm tired.  Our SLP sticks to motor control.  She has suggested to me at times that I work on minimal difference pairs, but she doesn't spend a lot of time on that or any other phonemic awareness.  I drive all that way for motor control therapy, and that's what she does.  So far his auditory discrimination of the letters has come in as his speech has come in, no issues there.  But now that he has basically all his letters, there doesn't seem to be that ability to take it to the next step.  I definitely think LIPS and that idea of slowing down and FEELING the components in words will make a huge difference.  I'm excited about it.

[OneStepAtATime]

I am excited for you, too.  Really curious to see if it helps....and extremely hopeful that it will.  I would hate for all your hard work to count for naught.  Good luck!

[PeterPan]

Ok, I have shivers about this.  Y'all realize you changed our lives?!?!  Like I sit down, just wanting to talk, because I was tired and had all these things on my mind, and y'all clue me into all these things that you could see that I couldn't.  It's amazing, and it gives me shivers because what if I HADN'T sat down here and what if y'all HADN'T taken the time to do that???  

 

Thanks.  You all did it for me 3 years ago when I wasn't sure about his speech and whether it was a non-issue, and now you've done it again.

 

  :001_wub:  :001_wub:  :001_wub:

[PeterPan]

I am excited for you, too.  Really curious to see if it helps....and extremely hopeful that it will.  I would hate for all your hard work to count for naught.  Good luck!

Only good vibes!  It's going to work, it's going to work!  Why wouldn't it work?  If it doesn't click, then we push the evals sooner and find out why.  If that doesn't work, something will work.  We don't give up around here!  :)

[OneStepAtATime]

Yes only good vibes!! Sorry. didn't mean for any bad vibes to get through the screening process.  I will tighten security next time.  :)  This is going to be great!

 

Oh, and I know that LiPS is not easy to do without training but my mom was the one who did it with my son.  She trained on it on her own and had no prior training in this type of system.  Now, she tends to be turtle slow at preparation for anything new, but she was successful and it really did help.  She took about 3 weeks to prep for the first lessons and sometimes prepped for several days between each additional lesson...but she did a great job and I am grateful.  

[LaughingCat]

This is interesting stuff - I appreciate you pushing that speech includes phonics/phonemes, Lecka, because this is the kind of stuff that if I had a better understanding of, maybe I could have figured things out a lot earlier. 

 

FWIW, we didn't struggle with doing LIPS ourselves at all and I didn't take any training but of course DD was older as well - she got the logic of it pretty fast. 

[PeterPan]

Yeah, I tend to think we're going to be fine with LIPS.  Hmm, I hadn't thought about the amount of prep.  I just figured we'd get into a routine and work a fuzz each day.  You're right though, that you could see it as this shizzam session and prepare and do it a couple times a week when he's ready.  Which way did you go Laughing Cat, drizzle or wham?  :)

[LaughingCat]

I started out wham and then went to drizzle lol!   Wham, consonants, wham, vowels,  drizzle practice.  Age/previous knowledge helped a lot to blow through the whams though.  Then we did a lot of daily drizzle using the mouth pictures when pulling apart words, forcing her to pay attention to her mouth.  That was the downside of age/knowledge - combating bad habits - the manual moves to tiles and reminding them verbally, but DD already had experience with tiles and I wanted her to create new habits instead of falling back on old ones.   

 

If I think about what I would do if it were DD^{the younger} though - it would have to be way less at a time.   More drizzle from the get go, and only if she was clearly getting it,  mini-whams.   When I looked over the manual again yesterday, I noticed how the secondary path (that bounces around the book) seemed to be a lot more like beginning reader stuff  - learn a few easier consonants and vowels and then work with those, then learn some more.  That would seem the way to go for a younger child, but for me, that would definitely take more time to put it together in my mind beforehand and plan what to do when (bouncing around the manual never seems to flow smoothly for me - I'd have to chop it together into a step by step plan).

[Lecka]

I think part of the point is not to bounce in easier consonants, if the goal is to tell them apart. It is a good way to do a lot of beginning reader things, but maybe not to work on discrimination.

 

With my little son (who has autism) he does discrimination tasks (but more with vocabulary words, not like this) and a big principle is that he has to be able to tell two things apart. If he knows two things separately, there is no way to know if that will transfer to telling them apart.

 

I have been thinking about this, and for my son, what helps so much is multisensory. Not just one aspect of multisensory, the joining of them. In knowing about a word, there is no separating: seeing the word, writing the word, saying the word, seeing your mouth when you say the word or hear it spoken, and feeling the movements of your mouth/tongue/throat (etc). They all go together. That is the meaning for "simultaneous multisensory instruction."

 

At this point it is not so helpful to me to think of "the one ring" learning methodology. I don't think my son has a "one ring." I think some kids do, though, and that is good for them. For my son I do think that all the different modalities add up to keep adding and adding to his understanding. It is more like using different materials to build a fire, and needing all of them. Not just big sticks and not just leaves or twigs. Partly because my son does need a lot of repetition. He needs a lot of angles. So on one hand, there are all the things I mentioned about a word. They are all important. At the same time, within writing, different ways of writing (dry erase, big finger tracing) help. Within seeing, underlining and using different colors both help. But he needs strategies and practice from each area to come together (when something is hard). That is multisensory instruction, and it is not quite the same idea as saying "oh VSL, we will focus on this one modality." I think all those strategies are great but they are not the only ones I would use, when something is not coming together.

 

Another idea I have is about the sounds. Here is how sounds go, to some extent. First maybe they hear a letter sound compared to another letter sound, and can learn letters. Awesome! Then they need to hear it in all positions in a word. Then as part of a blend. Then a triple-blend like str. Then with no visual (kind-of lip reading), so maybe on the phone is hard. Then it is harder with background noise. Then it is harder if the person has an accent. Then it is harder if the person has a low-pitched voice. Then it is harder if the person is talking quietly.

 

All of those things are factors, and I wonder if that is part of what you are seeing.

 

This year (age 8) is the first year my son has easily been able to follow directions in soccer, it his coach was a woman (easier to understand) and they practiced a distance from other teams and she spoke fairly slowly. Still -- it is so much better in every situation.

 

I do say words slowly and let him watch my mouth, along with writing words out. They are both good strategies for him.

 

The "slow saying of a word" is something I do a lot and I think it helps to hear the sounds for my son -- I would ask the speech therapist if that is going to harm him, and if he can imitate that for hearing sounds, or if you can demonstrate for him, etc. I think you should ask bc I think it is a helpful thing to do -- but you don't want to do it if it is bad to do. But if he gets to a level where it is appropriate maybe don't not do it bc it was bad to do 6 months ago.

 

Edit: I conflate multi sensory and multi modality. I think multi sensory is what the student does, and multimodality is how the instruction is presented. For presenting instruction I do think there can be a better way to present instruction that is the best for a child. But unless it is a detriment to present multi-modal I think it is good to do.

 

I think some kids are helped by combining, bc there are more hooks, and some are distracted, bc they can't focus on any one thing when there is too much information.

[LaughingCat]

Two things popped in my head this morning as I woke up (thinking about this thread too much lol!)

 

I don't agree that task C is only auditory memory.  If you only had to repeat back the sounds then it is only auditory memory (and that is what DD^{the older} failed at fwiw) but the building with squares is all about comparing the sounds to each other - and that is working memory.  So you could look at what part the child failed at.  However, I don't think that really matters for whether or not LIPS might help or not.  And I was definitely the wait person she described lol! even though I didn't start so early and DD did just what she described as well.  She stayed at the same level on that test - even though we were working on both auditory and working memory - which, looking at it now, pretty much proves it wasn't memory at all even though in the moment I continued to worry that it was.

 

The second thing was, I had decided not to do Barton because I have heard it is all about rules and applying them, and my DD does not do well with things like that.  Due to the Barton love about though, I bought Barton Level 1 used as we were doing LIPS just to see what it was about.  It starts with a lot of 2 letter nonsense words and pulling them apart and moves to more letters.  DD was doing fine pulling apart regular words (long words even - we spent a lot of time on ones she was mangling and those tended to be longer), so I didn't chose to follow Barton level 1.  But if you are thinking about it than doing the "regular" way of learning all the sound/mouth correlations up front would seem to be the way to go - once they're learned you'd jump right to Barton.  

 

I do think that you could use the few sounds method more easily just to teach "the idea" of pulling apart words though, especially with a beginning reader.  And you still are getting comparison, just between a smaller set : 6 of consonants and 2 vowels I believe.  What you lose up front IMO is the logical movement of the vowels (from front to back of mouth) but you get that back over time.    I think I will have to mull over Lecka's point some more though.

 

 

[Lecka]

Well, they call it discrimination tasks, but there may be some reason for it not to apply or not be so general.

 

Sometimes they want to build things up generally and then separate them, but sometimes they went to start him telling things apart from the beginning.

 

I think that the therapist knows which is best, from it being a known thing to some extent.

 

For autism though, it is important sometimes, bc kids may not be paying attention to the right detail, and it can be like they didn't learn it properly all along. If they are telling two things apart it can help them focus on what they need to focus on.

 

I don't really understand all the details, mainly I just know -- if the skill is discriminating, at some point it has to be straight-up discriminating, and then maybe jumping around would not be good, if it is designed to make kids discriminate.

 

But I mean more -- to be sure that the discriminating happens, even if it makes sense to start out not always doing it. I can see how it would make sense and give a better start, to get familiar with things that are easier, and understand what the system is and have some success, or other reasons, etc.

[myboyluvsdinos]

Hi, thanks for replying!  That gave me a lot more to chew on! 

 

 

Excited to hear you reached Susan. Sounds like you got a lot of good info from her. I wish you well on the journey. :)

[OneStepAtATime]

I am so glad that you reached Susan Barton and that she was of assistance to you.  You have helped so many others!  I am glad you are getting the help that you need, too.

 

Oh, by the way, for anyone else reading this post that is confused about Barton specifically, something that I think is not really well understood about Barton is the assumption that you are rote memorizing a bunch of rules.  It actually isn't like that, although I guess you could approach it that way.  My daughter cannot rote memorize, so rote memorization of rules would not have worked for her.  The child is told the rule, and the tutor repeatedly exposes the child to the wording of the rule, but the child isn't expected to memorize it.  They are shown the rule in practical application and then through repeated exposure using manipulatives, writing, reading, spelling, etc. the rule is internalized so you apply it automatically by the end of the lesson.  The child no longer has to think "Now what rule is this?".  They just see a word that has that rule in its construction and can read it automatically, or can hear the word spoken and know how to write it automatically.  If there is a word that sounds the same, but is spelled differently, they are taught how to determine which spelling will be the correct one in which context.

 

With some children, just going through the lesson as scripted is enough but with others they need additional exposure.  There is tutor support on the website providing additional worksheets and spelling lists, plus there are suggestions in the manual for games to play, leveled books to read, activities to do, etc. to reinforce the concepts and rules being taught.  You don't move on to the next lesson until the current rule is internalized and you don't move on to the next Level until the current Level is mastered.  Because there are so many ways to approach the rule you are learning, it doesn't seem like you are doing the same thing over and over.

 

Anyway, glad things are working out, OhElizabeth!   Really excited for you!

[PeterPan]

Lecka, your explanation of auditory discrimination has been fascinating.  Guess we'll see what happens when we start LIPS.  It probably explains though why he can distinguish the sound in isolation but not necessarily in a position on a word.  His ability to hear rhyming is sketchy at best.  Earobics tried to work on it with him in the frog activities, but it was like he'd do some, you think wow it's finally clicking, and then he'd miss some and you'd realize it still wasn't right.  So I'm glad to see where this is going.  I'm REALLY glad I'm getting some help, as it would have been a lot of work to figure that out on our own, as in I don't think I would have.   :blink: 

[PeterPan]

Two things popped in my head this morning as I woke up (thinking about this thread too much lol!)

 

I don't agree that task C is only auditory memory.  If you only had to repeat back the sounds then it is only auditory memory (and that is what DD^{the older} failed at fwiw) but the building with squares is all about comparing the sounds to each other - and that is working memory.  So you could look at what part the child failed at.  However, I don't think that really matters for whether or not LIPS might help or not.  And I was definitely the wait person she described lol! even though I didn't start so early and DD did just what she described as well.  She stayed at the same level on that test - even though we were working on both auditory and working memory - which, looking at it now, pretty much proves it wasn't memory at all even though in the moment I continued to worry that it was.

 

The second thing was, I had decided not to do Barton because I have heard it is all about rules and applying them, and my DD does not do well with things like that.  Due to the Barton love about though, I bought Barton Level 1 used as we were doing LIPS just to see what it was about.  It starts with a lot of 2 letter nonsense words and pulling them apart and moves to more letters.  DD was doing fine pulling apart regular words (long words even - we spent a lot of time on ones she was mangling and those tended to be longer), so I didn't chose to follow Barton level 1.  But if you are thinking about it than doing the "regular" way of learning all the sound/mouth correlations up front would seem to be the way to go - once they're learned you'd jump right to Barton.  

 

I do think that you could use the few sounds method more easily just to teach "the idea" of pulling apart words though, especially with a beginning reader.  And you still are getting comparison, just between a smaller set : 6 of consonants and 2 vowels I believe.  What you lose up front IMO is the logical movement of the vowels (from front to back of mouth) but you get that back over time.    I think I will have to mull over Lecka's point some more though.

Let me make sure I'm understanding you.  You're saying you went farther in LIPS, and at that point she was sort of through a chunk of the Barton level 1 skills in a way that made you decide to jump ship and not use Barton at all?  So you used??  And you regret that?  Yes, Barton said to look at the instructions on her site and jump from LIPS into Barton level 1 at the place she indicates.  I found those instructions before I called her.  It's definitely fascinating though to hear how it works out for people.  

 

Hmm, so you worked on auditory and working memory for a year, because you figured that was the issue, and still she was the same at section C?  Interesting.  Like I said, she said that story was pretty common and that if he was 5 and not passing the screening to go ahead and do LIPS.  It was this train of thought, that it wouldn't hurt him to go forward with the intervention but it WOULD hurt (or at least be a regret) if we waited and realized a year later we still needed it, that drove me to intervene early and hard in ds's speech.  When they're newly 2, barely 2, some people are still of the wait, blah blah, perspective.  I've gotten some of that with him being newly 5 too, with people saying I'm jumping the gun.  But the stats are there, and it hurts NOTHING to move forward with LIPS.  If I'm right, I caught it.  If nothing is wrong, no harm, he just flies through the material.  But if I waited a year and he still was at the same place, I would be one really sad mama, frankly.  He deserves better.

 

Oh, and someone was asking me why we would inadvertently baby a dc with apraxia, even when we know in our head we shouldn't and don't intend to.  Besides the youngest child syndrome (haha), it's that his voice is still a fuzz babyish.  He sounds deeper and more mature than he used to.  If you listen to him right now though, playing in the other room, when he talks to himself for his play, some of the voices will be total Minnie Mouse.  Mostly it's lower and more normal now, but when he gets excited it still goes up and is sort of babyish.  He meows and will crawl on the floor.  My dd acted very young like that until we did VT, so I definitely think there's something to the idea that they hide their struggles with odd behaviors.  He gives no indication of being on the spectrum, nor does she.  It's just that sometimes he's really YOUNG.  And I'm starting to think his impulse control is about ZILCH, but that's for another thread I guess.  Or maybe we could keep going here?  

 

For you all that did evals when they were young, at what point could they say something helpful about issues like impulse control and processing speed?  Barton mentioned the TONI, a test of non-verbal intelligence that could be used with kids with less speech.  I need to see if that would give me processing speed.  Right now it's very hard to know how to connect with him to get some thought process going for discipline purposes.  It's like everything that crosses his mind fleetingly just HAPPENS and never gets reflected upon.  It's really astonishing, as if there's no check.  So instruction seems to have little effect where there's no check, kwim?

 

Aside from the obvious challenges that makes with disciplining, I don't know what effect anything going on there has on his ability to process things we work on together, kwim?  So if I could find the right person, I think Barton was right that it might help us to get some evals, ugh.  Oh, I realized that the Barton levels aren't $1K except for tutors.  For us they're more $250-300, whew.  I was really concerned there, because I had gotten in my head they were $1K apiece!

[myboyluvsdinos]

Aside from the obvious challenges that makes with disciplining, I don't know what effect anything going on there has on his ability to process things we work on together, kwim?  So if I could find the right person, I think Barton was right that it might help us to get some evals, ugh.  Oh, I realized that the Barton levels aren't $1K except for tutors.  For us they're more $250-300, whew.  I was really concerned there, because I had gotten in my head they were $1K apiece!

 

Levels 3-10 are $300 each, but you can sell them for at least $200 each, just so you know. If it took you 3 years (or however many) to go through all the levels, you are looking at a net output of $1,000 ($100 per level after reselling).