Summer's Journey

July marked the first year anniversary of Summer's Therapy Services ! As the founder and director of Summer's , I am proud to announce that with effect from 1 July 2016, we are known as Summer's Therapy Services Private Limited . It has been a really enjoyable year working with children in their homes. Several parents have shared that they appreciate that the sessions are at home because their child is much happier in therapy. This feedback encourages me greatly. I am thankful that I have created a service which helps these families. July was also a month of visions! At this one year mark, I am reminded of why I had started  Summer's , when one of my good friends, Lee, introduced a book called 'Larger than Life'. It is a collection of stories of Singaporeans who are serving in developing countries, through a wide range of projects, using whatever talents and skills they have been blessed with. Be inspired by Larger than Life ! Several years ago...

The Speech Buddies is a rather interesting set of tools. It targets the five most common problem sounds. Each tool trains the tongue to make the correct shape by providing targets that the child can feel. http://www.speechbuddy.com/parents/tools I will share about three children whom I have used the tools with. And all were success stories! However, I regret to say that all three had problems with the same sound /l/.   The Story of Ariel   Age: Turning 7 this year Problem Sound: /l/ Her Story: Ariel was having severe motor planning difficulties when I first met her. We worked on sequential movements, through activities for gradation and dissociation of her jaw, lips and tongue. After about 6 months, we started on individual sounds. She sailed through /s/, /z/, /f/ and /v/ but her difficulties with /l/ persisted. Ariel tends to stick her tongue out between her teeth when saying words such as 'lion' and 'lamb'. She has difficulty with tongue elevation, i...

I love the mummies (and daddies) whom I work with. They are so resourceful, always looking out for new therapy tools and approaches to help their child. They are so willing to share their discoveries and I can pass it on to bless other parents. One of the best recommendations is SPEECH BUDDIES. https://www.speechbuddy.com/parents/tools The child, let's call her Ariel, is turning 7 this year and she presented with severe motor planning difficulties when I first met her 9 months ago. With fervent follow-up on the home tasks by her mum, Ariel has made much improvement and we progressed to working on individual speech sounds. Ariel sailed through sounds such as /s/, /z/, /f/ and /v/, in isolation (initial and final positions) and in words. However, her difficulties with /l/ persisted. I tried the following methods and tools and achieved little success: (1) Tapping the back of her upper front teeth to encourage tongue elevation (2) Using the Tongue Elevator (3) Using PR...

Recently my mum suffered a little injury and needed Physiotherapy. An enthusiastic me accompanied her to the first session and met with the Physiotherapist (PT). The PT prescribed a few exercises and massages as home practice. I assured the PT that I would be able to do all these home tasks with my mum and hence a review was booked for a long three weeks later. Being a therapist myself, I have given tonnes of home practices to parents. I am no stranger to home practices. My philosophy is "these exercies and strategies are pretty straight forward. You don't need to spend money on more sessions, just for me to come and do these exercises or practice these strategies." Well, with my mum's episode, I was placed on the other side. And there were a few 'ah-ha' moments. Firstly, it takes quite a bit of patience to do home practice with someone you are closely related to. I quickly became annoyed when my mum was unable to do as instructed. My expectations of...

Happy new year! It has been six months since the setup of Summer's Therapy Services. Things are starting to pick up and I am feeling more settled. I reflected and looked at where I am today and was thrown back to Year 2000 when I first came to know about the profession of Speech Therapy. In 2000, I was an undergraduate at National University of Singapore (NUS), majoring in Social Work and Psychology. I came across Speech Therapy during one of my Social Work internship in a special school. Since then, I knew that this is where my passion lies. Upon gradation from NUS in 2002, I worked as a therapy assistant at one of the acute hospitals in Singapore. Without the appropriate qualification, being a therapy assistant is the closest thing I could get to being a Speech Therapist, or any allied health professional. That lasted for a year and a half before I was granted a government scholarship to pursue a degree in Speech Therapy in Australia. I graduated in end 2007 and started...

SNIPPET (1) I have always loved how Mum relates with him. She never treats him as a child with Autism. She brought him for cycling from East Coast to Marina Barage on the PCN. She brought him to Taiwan for holiday. She brought him to Christmas Wonderland at Gardens by the Bay. She brought him to Home Team Festival at Singapore Expo. She gives him all the opportunities and experiences a typically-developing boy would have... and more. She gives him her unconditional love. And of course, with this, he grows into a highly-esteemed boy, achieving his potential. This December, he will be having a piano performance during a church service. And I am honoured to be invited. SNIPPET (2) This month I went on a consultation trip in Brunei. I saw three children and made one of them cry... badly... (and I felt really bad even if it was only for three minutes). In a consultation session (especially when overseas), I have little time to build rapport with the child. There are many th...

I would love to share the attached video of Lori Overland, a renowned Speech Therapist who specialises in children's oral motor, feeding and speech difficulties. In my previous post, I mentioned the reasons for the lack of success in oromotor therapy for some children. I also added that in addition to oromotor tools, PROMPT and NDT approaches are often used in my treatment of articulation difficulties (may it be muscle-based difficulties or motor-planning difficulties). This video captures exactly what I am trying to say: Lori Overland (the featured Speech Therapist) assessed Nathan (the featured child) using Talktools and Ark's oromotor tools. She looked into jaw strength and gradation, as well as lip-jaw and tongue-jaw dissociation. She also assessed the child's feeding skills, despite the lack of strong evidence in the link between feeding skills and speech. Lori's feeding assessment showed that Nathan does have feeding problems (his feeding skills are funct...