Articulation, Language, and Fluency: How do I get a gifted 7th grader to care about his speech?

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How do I get a gifted 7th grader to care about his speech?

Posted by SunnySpeech on 3/25/2012, 6:43 pm
75.131.202.112

I've only had this student on my caseload a few months. He's in all gifted classes in the 7th grade. He can make a perfect /s/ in connected speech when he is focused on it and when I ask him to, but otherwise he really doesn't see a problem and doesn't care about using it in his daily life. He is a nice kid, super bright, compliant and does everything that I ask him to do while he's with me. (just doesn't practice at home)

How do I get him to care? We just had an IEP meeting and he's been working on this sound for so long, this is probably the last year that he will have to correct it because after that his mom will probably just let it go. I really don't want him to grow up with a lisp.

I thought about showing him youtube videos with people having all kinds of speech impairments. For him, he doesn't think his /s/ sound is a big deal but he is so desensitized to it and doesn't even pay attention to it. I wondered if he would feel differently if he saw intelligent people, such as himself, having difficulty with other sounds or stuttering, whatever. I just want him to realize how important clear communication is in general so that maybe he will care about his own.

What about a reward system of some sort? Need to be creative here. Any suggestions?

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