Clinical Approach
Our Clinical Approaches
At Sensory Speech & OT Therapy, we employ several specialized approaches to support your child’s development. The Greenspan Floortime Approach, designed by Dr. Stanley Greenspan, engages children at their developmental level to foster creativity and emotional growth. The Beckman Oral Motor Protocol, created by Debra Beckman, enhances oral motor skills crucial for speech and feeding through gentle, playful techniques. The SOS Feeding Approach holistically addresses eating difficulties, integrating sensory, motor, and behavioral strategies. The PROMPT Approach uses tactile cues to improve speech production, while the Kaufman Speech to Language Protocol focuses on motor planning for children with speech sound disorders. Lastly, our Sensory Integration approach helps children organize sensory input effectively, promoting calmness, attention, and adaptive responses to daily challenges.
Greenspan Floortime Approach
The Greenspan Floortime Approach, conceived by the late Dr. Stanley Greenspan, is a method that embraces
children at their current developmental stage, leveraging their strengths and capabilities to foster a warm interactive connection. It encourages them to progress at their own pace and reach new levels of development comfortably.
At Sensory Speech & OT Therapy, we adopt a similar approach, engaging with your child on their terms, encouraging creativity and spontaneity, and broadening their experiences to encompass all or most of their senses, motor skills, and emotional range. Dr. Greenspan designed Floortime to empower families in nurturing their child's development, serving as both an intervention for children with special needs and as a supportive tool for healthy child development overall.
Beckman Oral Motor
Developed by Debra Beckman, MS, CCC-SLP, who has been practicing since 1975, this approach is a method for evaluating and addressing weakness (hypotonicity) across the oral-facial structures. The Beckman Oral Motor Protocol involves using assisted movement and stretch reexes to stimulate muscle contraction, enhance strength, and increase range of motion in the lips, jaw, tongue, and soft palate. It evaluates responses to pressure, movement, range, and strength, as well as the variety and control of movement. Even children unable to follow verbal commands due to motor planning diculties or cognitive decits can benet from this approach. It is also eective for infants, aiding in the improvement of oral motor skills crucial for feeding and speech development. The Beckman Oral Motor Intervention is versatile, supporting both speech production and feeding skills. It can also address issues such as tooth grinding, drooling, and hyper/hyposensitivity. Techniques employed are executed in a playful, gentle manner to ensure all children feel respected
PROMPT Approach
Prompts for Restructuring Oral Muscular Phonetic Targets (PROMPT) is an approach to speech therapy that involves tactile-kinesthetic techniques. In this method, the speech-language pathologist applies touch
cues on your child’s face to guide and shape the movement of articulators, including the jaw, lips, tongue, and
vocal folds. These specic touch cues help your child produce syllables, words, or phrases, facilitating speech planning, coordination, and production. As your child's speech improves, the use of touch cues is gradually reduced. PROMPT-trained speech-language pathologists consider not only the physical aspects of speech
production but also the child’s overall development, including language, social, and emotional factors. Research indicates that PROMPT has been eective in treating various communication disorders,including articulation delays, motor speech diculties, and childhood apraxia of speech. Additionally, studies suggest its ecacy in other populations, such as adults with apraxia and aphasia. At Sensory Speech & OT Therapy, we are proud to oer speech and language therapy with PROMPT Trained Level 1 Speech-Language Pathologists.
SOS Feeding Approach
The Sequential Oral Sensory Approach to Feeding, known as The SOS Approach, is a transdisciplinary program crafted to assess and tackle the underlying causes behind a child's eating diculties. This approach
considers various factors, including organs, muscles, sensory responses, learning capabilities, developmental stages, nutritional needs, and environmental inuences. Utilizing a holistic perspective, The SOS Approach incorporates sensory, motor, oral-motor, behavioral/learning, medical, and nutritional aspects both in assessment and intervention. This results in strategies that comprehensively evaluate and address feeding and growth challenges in children. Success is measured by (a) an intrinsic and sustained interest in trying new foods, (b) the ability to enjoy and skillfully consume a wide range of age-appropriate foods and uids, (c) intake of sucient calories for optimal growth along the child’s growth curve, and (d) enhanced family dynamics during mealtimes, fostering healthy relationships with food and one another.
Kaufman Speech to Language Protocol
The Kaufman Speech to Language Protocol (K-SLP), developed by Nancy R. Kaufman, MA, CCC-SLP, is an evidence-based approach for evaluating and treating children with childhood apraxia of speech (CAS), as well as other speech sound disorders and expressive language diculties. The K-SLP emphasizes the coordination of speech motor skills,including shaping consonants, vowels, and syllable structures. It integrates teaching strategies from applied behavior analysis and principles of motor learning, aligning with current research in CAS, neuroscience, sensory-motor development, and early language development.
Sensory Integration
Sensory Integration refers to the body's ability to effectively organize incoming sensory stimuli, enabling appropriate responses to everyday situations in natural environments. Recognized senses include vision, smell, taste, hearing, touch, vestibular sense, proprioception, and interoception.As occupational therapists, we emphasize the importance of sensory integration due to its profound impact on developmental, cognitive, academic, and emotional advancement. This approach empowers children to regulate themselves, fostering calm and adaptive behaviors. Achieving a state of calmness enhances attention, concentration, responsiveness, and engagement in age-appropriate activities. By mastering adaptive responses, children can effectively overcome internal and external challenges they encounter.Common challenges in natural environments may manifest as:Clumsiness and poor postural control
Difficulty remaining calm, characterized by restless behavior such as constant running, touching objects, and purposeless jumping
Emotional outbursts or tantrums
Poor attention span Social avoidance or difficulties Impulsivity Abnormal arousal levels (passive versus active) Sensory sensitivities, such as poor tolerance for certain food textures or grooming activities
Challenges with navigating different surfaces or heights Sensitivity to clothing or unstable equipment like swings or stairs
Frequent falls or collisions. Multi-sensory approaches during therapy offer numerous benefits, including: Modulation of sensory systems Development of self-regulation skills Enhanced functional abilities at school, home, and in the community
Increased independence in activities of daily living (ADLs) Improved motor planning Active engagement and exploration of surroundings Efficient processing and organization of sensory information